Samuel Beckett rejected as unsuitable for the Nobel prize in 1968

Newly released papers show the committee chairman’s doubts in 1968 whether a prize for the Irish author would be in the spirit of the award

Samuel Beckett won the Nobel prize for literature in 1969, but newly released archives reveal that just a year earlier, the secretive committee that selects the winners had raised serious concerns about whether his writing was consistent with the spirit of the award.

In the words of Alfred Nobel’s will, the honour goes to an author who has written “the most outstanding work in an ideal direction”. The winner is decided each year by the members of the Swedish Academy, with their deliberations kept secret for 50 years. Just-released documents from 1968 show the committee’s chairman, Anders Österling, writing that “regarding Samuel Beckett, unfortunately, I have to maintain my basic doubts as to whether a prize to him is consistent with the spirit of Nobel’s will”.

Related: The ugly scandal that cancelled the Nobel prize

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