Dylan teaches China about the value of a Nobel
The Nobel season has passed again. Although no Chinese candidate was awarded any Nobel Prize this year, as usual, apparently Chinese netizens feel thrilled due to the unexpected literature award winner and his unexpected indifference to the influential prize.
The Swedish Academy said Monday that it had given up trying to reach Bob Dylan after awarding him the Nobel Prize in literature for “having created new poetic expressions within the great American song tradition.” The US iconic musician had neither acknowledged nor rejected the prize, giving this year’s controversial award a quite awkward snub. No one can be sure whether Dylan will show up at the reception banquet in Stockholm on December 10 or not.
Chinese people have long held a complex about winning a Nobel Prize, as the expanding middle class has a growing demand for culture and prestige. For many years, the middle class has been deeply disappointed when no Chinese receives the prize. Predictably, heated discussions are set off as to why China fails in winning the prize, long and tedious articles are published to dig into the question, and the cycle repeats the next year. The middle class want the prize to prove that the rapidly prospering country is indeed a power in all respects and is well recognized and received by the rest of the world. A Nobel Prize laureate can be more alluring and popular among Chinese audiences than any other figure. However, all of a sudden Chinese were shocked when Dylan gave a cold or even contemptuous response to the coveted prize. On the night that he won the prize, Dylan gave a public performance in Las Vegas, without any mention of the award. His friend Leonard Cohen suggested that no prizes were necessary to recognize the greatness of Dylan, as the Nobel “is like pinning a medal on Mount Everest for being the highest mountain.” A great number of Chinese netizens expressed approval on social media for Dylan’s defiant attitude and also his strong sense of self that allows no external disruption. They have come to realize that perhaps winning the prize doesn’t mean much to a person who has already done a brilliant job in their profession. It has more significance when people fully concentrate on what they are adept in to make the world a better place, rather than pinning too much of their faith in getting a prize to show one’s value.
It is fair to say that the Chinese anxiety and thirst for the Nobel prize has been eased to some extent after pharmaceutical chemist Tu Youyou became the first Chinese Nobel laureate in physiology or medicine last year and novelist Mo Yan was awarded the Nobel Prize in literature in 2012. After all, these were the first winners.
Dylan’s defiance enables many Chinese netizens to put more thought into the Nobel Prize. The prize is still significant, though it often arouses controversy, particularly in its awards of non-natural sciences due to political involvement. Yet those great people picked for the Nobel prize never give the award much space on their path toward exploring the world.
How many roads must we walk before we become fully confident? The answer is not blowing in the wind. It may have started.