Nobel Prize for Literature postponed in wake of sex scandal

The Swedish Academy has presented that no Nobel Prize for literature will most certainly be awarded this 300 and sixty five days, in the wake of a monetary and sexual scandal that has engulfed the physique accountable for deciding on the winner.

The Academy said on Friday that it aimed to award two prizes, including for this 300 and sixty five days, in 2019.

The controversy comes from Jean-Claude Arnault, a notorious figure in Swedish cultural establishments.

Arnault has been accused of multiple acts of sexual assault and harassment, including one incident wherein he allegedly touched Sweden’s Crown Princess Victoria inappropriately.

Six participants of the group maintain resigned in contemporary weeks, including Katarina Frostenson, Arnault’s wife.
The Academy lower ties with Arnault in 2017, quickly after the allegations grew to change into public.

Bjorn Hurtig, the legal professional representing Arnault, has said his client denies the allegations.

The resolution to extend naming a Nobel laureate become taken at a assembly by the commitee’s 10 closing participants on Thursday.

« The disaster in the Swedish Academy has adversely affected the Nobel Prize. Their resolution underscores the seriousness of the scheme back and can impartial abet safeguard the long-time length reputation of the Nobel Prize, » the root said in a assertion launched Friday.

The muse has confronted additional criticism for providing funding to a cultural centre headed by Arnault and Frostenson in an obvious breach of warfare of curiosity laws.

An self sustaining investigation commissioned by the Swedish Academy stumbled on proof of monetary misconduct and « unacceptable habits » by Arnault « in the assemble of undesirable intimacy, nonetheless the info become no longer widely unfold in the Academy ».

On the opposite hand, the investigation stumbled on a letter dating encourage to 1996 which alleged sexual misconduct on Arnault’s fragment, suggesting a protracted history of impropriety.

The Swedish Academy said in an April assertion that it « deeply regrets that the letter become shelved and no measures taken to analysis the costs. »

The extend for the 2018 prize in literature isn’t any longer going to maintain an impact on varied awards, the Nobel Foundation assertion said.