Canadian Anne Carson awarded Nobel Prize in Literature - CBC

Anne Carson, the Canadian poet, essayist, professor of classics and translator, has won the 2026 Nobel Prize in literature. The prize, announced at the Swedish Academy in Stockholm on Thursday, awarded Carson “for her bold and inventive oeuvre that, in playful dialogue with the classical tradition, has created new forms for contemporary literature.” Carson is the 19th woman to win. Among Carson’s myriad acclaimed works are her novel in verse “Autobiography of Red” and its sequel, “Red Doc>”; her seminal book of literary criticism, “Eros the Bittersweet”; poetry collections such as “Glass, Irony, and God” — which contains “The Glass Essay” — and the T. S.

Carson is only the third Canadian Nobel laureate for literature, after Saul Bellow and Alice Munro. Nobel laureate Anne Carson, seen in 2015, has "inspired not only generations of writers, scholars and readers, but also the many students and colleagues who were fortunate to learn and work alongside her at McGill," university president Deep Saini said in a statement. (Pontus Lundahl / TT News Agency/AFP via Getty Images)

When the Swedish Academy announced Anne Carson as the recipient of the 2026 Nobel Prize in Literature, in Stockholm, I was participating in a panel discussion in the same city at Stockholm University about possible laureates — and the literary traditions they represent. Before the announcement, I had spoken about two Canadian writers, Margaret Atwood and Carson, whose international recognition reflects different trajectories within contemporary literature.