Stockholm - US folk icon Bob Dylan was awarded the 2016 Nobel Prize in Literature, the Swedish Academy said on Thursday.
Dylan, 75, won the award for creating “new poetic expressions within the great American song tradition”, Academy Permanent Secretary Sara Danius said after announcing the prize.
“He samples the great tradition all the way from American folk song to delta blues to the Appalachian to French modernism ... in a very original way,” she told reporters, adding that he had repeatedly reinvented himself and his craft.
Originally becoming famous as a protest singer in the 1960s, with songs such as “Masters of War” and “The Times they are A-Changin'”, Dylan also penned the rock classic “Like a Rolling Stone”.
As well as touring very late into his career, Dylan has hosted a critically-acclaimed radio show and written the well-received memoir “Chronicles.”
Last year, the Academy selected Belarusian author and investigative journalist Svetlana Alexievich for the literature prize.
Thursday's announcement completed the annual Nobel Prize announcements. Awards have earlier been awarded in the fields of medicine, physics, chemistry, peace and economics.
This year, the prizes are each worth 8 million kronor (930,000 dollars). The awards are presented every year on December 10, the anniversary of the death of Swedish industrialist Alfred Nobel.
DPA