When Jean-Paul Sartre received the Nobel that he had rejected a week before

On October 14, 1964, Jean-Paul Sartre asked the Swedish Academy not to nominate him for the Nobel Prize of Literature. The letter arrived late. His victory had already been decided and, on a day like today, but from that year, he was announced as the winner.

What did the letter say? Sartre “begged that they give the prize to some other writer more worthy of such consecration”, tells “La Vanguardia”. She was not interested in that or the US$52,000 at the time.

“For reasons that are personal to me and for others that are more objective, I do not want to appear on the list of possible laureates and neither can nor do I want, either in 1964 or later, to accept this honorary distinction.“, wrote.

Days later, in a letter addressed to “Le Monde”, he explained that he was unaware that the Nobel Prize was awarded without “consult the opinion of the recipient” and that he had just understood that the election could not be revoked.

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It wasn’t the first time Jean-Paul Sartre refused an award. She did it in 1945, when she was offered to be part of the French Legion of Honor.

Why?

He explained it:

“This attitude is based on my conception of the writer’s mission. A writer who adopts political, social, literary positions must act consistently with these positions through his own, that is, the written word. All the honors that he can receive expose his readers to a pressure that I do not consider desirable. If I subscribe to Jean-Paul Sartre it is not the same as if I subscribe to Nobel Prize winner Jean-Paul Sartre”.

That is to say, that, from his gaze, “the writer must refuse to allow himself to be transformed into an institution, even if this occurs under the most honorable circumstances”.

Money also seemed like a “torture”.

“Either the prize is accepted and with the prize money I can support organizations or movements or else one declines the initially generous prize and thus deprives a movement of much-needed support“, wrote.

According to Kjell Espmark, poet and member of the Swedish AcademySartre did claim the money.

Source: Elcomercio

Ronald Payne

I, Ronald Payne, am a journalist and author who dedicated his life to telling the stories that need to be said. I have over 7 years of experience as a reporter and editor, covering everything from politics to business to crime.