Knut Hamsun won the 1920 Nobel Prize in Literature for Growth of the Soil.
Hamsun was born Knud Pedersen in Gudbrandsdalen, Norway, in 1859. He grew up in poverty, worked at several jobs and spent periods in the United States before establishing himself as a writer. His breakthrough novel Hunger, published in 1890, helped pioneer psychological and modernist fiction.
The Nobel Prize recognized Growth of the Soil, whose Norwegian title is Markens Grøde. Published in 1917, the novel follows Isak, a farmer who builds a life through labor and attachment to the land. Its celebration of rural existence reflected Hamsun’s suspicion of industrial modernity and urban civilization.
Hamsun remains a controversial figure because of his support for Nazi Germany during the Second World War. That political history does not change the fact that he received the 1920 prize. He is sometimes confused with Sigrid Undset, another Norwegian Nobel laureate, who won in 1928.