Between 1901 and 2017, the
Nobel Prizes and the
Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences were awarded 585 times to 923 people and organizations. With some receiving the Nobel Prize more than once, this makes a total of 892 individuals (including 844 men, 48 women) and 24 organizations. Six Nobel laureates were not permitted by their governments to accept the Nobel Prize.
Adolf Hitler forbade four Germans,
Richard Kuhn (Chemistry, 1938),
Adolf Butenandt (Chemistry, 1939),
Gerhard Domagk (Physiology or Medicine, 1939) and
Carl von Ossietzky (Peace, 1936) from accepting their Nobel Prizes. The
Chinese government forbade
Liu Xiaobo from accepting his Nobel Prize (Peace, 2010) and the government of the
Soviet Union pressured
Boris Pasternak (Literature, 1958) to decline his award.
Liu Xiaobo,
Carl von Ossietzky and
Aung San Suu Kyi were all awarded their Nobel Prize while in prison or detention. Two Nobel laureates,
Jean-Paul Sartre (Literature, 1964) and
Lê Ðức Thọ (Peace, 1973), declined the award; Sartre declined the award as he declined all official honors, and Thọ declined the award due to the situation Vietnam was in at the time. Seven laureates have received more than one prize; of the seven, the
International Committee of the Red Cross has received the
Nobel Peace Prize three times, more than any other.
UNHCR (United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees) has been awarded the
Nobel Peace Prize twice. Also the
Nobel Prize in Physics was awarded to
John Bardeen twice, as was the
Nobel Prize in Chemistry to
Frederick Sanger and
Karl Barry Sharpless. Two laureates have been awarded twice but not in the same field:
Marie Curie (Physics and Chemistry) and
Linus Pauling (Chemistry and Peace). Among the 892 Nobel laureates, 48 have been women; the first woman to receive a Nobel Prize was
Marie Curie, who received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1903. She was also the first person (male or female) to be awarded two Nobel Prizes, the second award being the Nobel Prize in Chemistry, given in 1911. == List of laureates ==