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>Sweden does have a tradition of proletarian poetry and I can imagine that the US blues and folk traditions against which Dylan operated would seem similar. It does indeed, David. And historically much Swedish poetry is popular poetry and there is not so very much in terms of literary status to separate proletarian poets like Harry Martinson or Dan Andersson (who did compose music too) from a troubadour such as Evert Taube (active and hugely popular in the 1920s-1950s). So, as often happens, the committee's award does have a local Nordic message embedded in it, if one looks out for it. Still the larger messages are about how literature so often mixes with other arts, about orality and sound. Weren't the oldest literary texts we know about, such as epic or eulogy, almost invariably musical?