section_path: Criticism/Controversies about Nobel laureate selections
section_name: Controversies about Nobel laureate selections
paragraph_text: Controversies about Nobel laureate selections
  
  From 1901 to 1912, the committee, led by the conservative Carl David af Wirsén, assessed the literary quality of a work in relation to its contribution to humanity's pursuit of the "ideal." Leo Tolstoy, Henrik Ibsen, Émile Zola, and Mark Twain were rejected in favour of authors who mostly are little read today.
  
  Later, the prize has often been controversial due to the Swedish Academy's Eurocentric choices of laureates, or for political reasons, as seen in the years 1970, 2005, and 2019, and for the Academy awarding its own members, as happened in 1974.