The Nobel Prize for Literature has been mired in controversy in earlier years, but knitting the brow together with the secretive body that chooses the award appeared to have decided, “Now, now, it will be Gluck. There’ll be none of that nonsense seen in the year 2018; those are the rules.” The selection panel must have smiled, taking the sting out of the mild condemnation. It has now been given to American poet Louise Glück “for her unmistakable poetic voice that with austere beauty makes individual existence universal”.
Being a poet and essayist, she established herself as a formidable literary figure following the publication of her second poetic collection, The House on Marshland in 1975. Her first collection was titled Firstborn. She has been consistently writing poems, responding to the times we live in with her written word.
Born in the year of 1943, it is wholly not wrong to bring in literary talent from developed countries like the US. The choice periodically falls upon the right person there. The very name of Louise Gluck, for example, gets to be recorded in the long list of Nobel awardees and her literary role would have a greater impact in the field of literature. In the yesteryears, there used to be poet laureates but presently we learn about Nobel litterateurs.