French · 1859–1941
Henri Bergson won the 1927 Nobel Prize in Literature "in recognition of his rich and vitalizing ideas and the brilliant skill with which they have been presented." The French philosopher's work on time, memory, and creative evolution influenced modernist literature profoundly—Proust was his cousin by marriage. "Creative Evolution" proposed élan vital as life's animating force. Bergson demonstrated that philosophy could be written beautifully.