For years, Americans have been complaining that the Swedish Academy is turning a blind eye to the U.S. - based literary works, basing their affirmation, among others, on the fact that this year’s Nobel Literature laureate isn’t popular in the U.S. Unfortunately, this can account for two things: first of all, that a writer doesn’t need American approval to become a Nobel laureate and, secondly, that we are being overly sensitive and take another country’s success as a personal offence.

The 2008 Nobel Literature laureate is French writer Jean-Marie Gustave Le Clezio, and his selection has caused the Nobel-related turmoil in the U.S. The Americans’ feeling that we’re being dismissed from the start as potential laureates has a bit of truth in it, unfortunately sustained by the permanent secretary of the Swedish Academy, Horace Engdahl. In his words, the American literary culture is too insular and too isolated. He also accused it of not translating enough and thus not being an integral part of the world’s literary dialogue. The Americans took this as further proof of the insularity of the Nobel Foundation itself and it led them to believe that American culture will again be overlooked. Unfortunately, the result met the expectations and Engdahl’s words were taken far too...literally.

The last American writer to have won the Prize is Toni Morrison, in the 1993 edition of the Nobel Prizes. Considering the last three highly controversial winners – British Harold Pinter who tore the Bush administration apart in his acceptance speech, Turkish Orhan Pamuk who was criminally charged for a while in Turkey and British Doris Lessing who openly and fervently lobbied for nuclear disarmament – the Americans are also under the impression that the Nobel Prizes are also given for political considerations, although never underestimating the quality of the winners’ works. American literature did have two chances this year, namely Philip Roth and Joyce Carol Oates. While the latter isn’t considered “Nobel material,” Roth wasn’t picked because he received massive support, something which the Academy frowns upon.