The Swedish Academy to announce Nobel Prize in Literature Winner.

Accompanied by rampant speculation that is rarely accurate, the Swedish Academy prepared on Thursday to award the 2012 Nobel Prize in Literature, the cultural high point of a week of accolades to scientists, writers and peacemakers.

Since 1901, 104 Nobel literature prizes have been awarded, the most recent to Tomas Transtromer, a Swedish poet, whose more than 15 collections of poetry, the academy said last year, offered “condensed, translucent images” through which “he gives us fresh access to reality.”
The panel selecting the winner prides itself on its inscrutability and, according to the Nobel Web site, “the nominations and the opinions written by the members of the Nobel Committee in Literature each year are kept secret for 50 years.”

The selection of a European writer for the 2011 literature prize — the eighth in a decade — complaints revived that the award is too Eurocentric. The last American writer to win a Nobel was Toni Morrison in 1993. Philip Roth has been a perennial favorite but has not been selected.
The prize is worth 8 million Swedish kronor, about $1.2 million.

Despite the unreliability of attempts to forecast the winner, bookmakers have tipped contenders this year including the Japanese author Haruki Murakami but gamblers have placed bets on a wide array of others, including Bob Dylan at 10 to 1. The odds offered on Wednesday by the British bookmaker Ladbrokes put Mr. Murakami as the favorite at 2 to 1 with William Trevor at 7 to 1 and Chinese writer Mo Yan at 8 to 1.
The academy has routinely named winners from beyond the circle of those tipped by gambling institutions, but betting on the outcome remains “as popular worldwide as ever,” spokesman Alex Donohue of Ladbrokes told The Daily Telegraph.

Nobel committees have announced prizes so far this week in physics, chemistry and medicine. The 2012 Nobel peace laureate is to be named on Friday by the Norwegian Nobel Committee and the prize in economics is to be announced on t Monday by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences.