So you think you know who’s going to win the Nobel Prize in Literature on Thursday? Well, how much do you want to bet?
The British betting company Ladbrokes Coral has set the odds for the award, the Guardian reports. Guadeloupean historical novelist Maryse Condé is a slight favorite over Russian author Lyudmila Ulitskaya, Japanese writer Haruki Murakami, and Canadian novelist and dystopia predictor Margaret Atwood.
Condé has 4:1 odds to take home the prize, with Ulitskaya at 5:1 and Murakami and Atwood both at 6:1.
Kenyan author Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o has 8:1 odds, followed by Canadian poet Anne Carson, Spanish novelist Javier Marías, and South Korean poet Ko Un, all at 10:1.
The Swedish Academy has a way of surprising readers, though—think Bob Dylan’s victory in 2016. So Ladbrokes has named several underdogs at 33:1 odds, including Wolf Hall author Hilary Mantel, Norwegian author and former cigarette enthusiast Karl Ove Knausgård, and American author William T. Vollmann.
The longest odds set for the literature Nobel belong to Stephen King at 50:1 and Richard Osman, a British television host whose debut mystery novel came out last month, at 100:1.
The Guardian quotes Swedish journalist Björn Wiman as saying he thinks the prize will go to “a safe choice” after last year’s Peter Handke controversy. Wiman expects that Antiguan American author Jamaica Kincaid will take home the $1.1 million award.
Michael Schaub is a Texas-based journalist and regular contributor to NPR.
