Sir — This refers to the editorial, “A poet of protest, hope” (October 15). Bob Dylan is the first musician to win the 2016 Nobel Prize for literature, and his selection is, perhaps, the most radical choice in a history, stretching back to 1901.
In choosing a popular musician for the literary world’s highest honour, the Swedish academy, which awards the prize, dramatically re-defined the boundaries of literature, setting off a debate about whether song lyrics have the same artistic value as poetry or novels.
However, the announcement can trigger a debate across the literary world, with an immediate challenge to the notion that Dylan was the first songwriter to win the literature Nobel. That distinction belonged to Rabindranath Tagore, though the Nobel Prize in literature in 1913 was awarded to Tagore the poet and not Tagore the songwriter because of his profoundly sensitive, fresh and beautiful verse.