The Research Prizes 2023

Professor Anne-Marie Mai from the University of Southern Denmark has been awarded the prize for her contributions to Danish literary history research, which have altered our perception of how literature can be studied and analysed. She has also led the way in research into literature written by women and, for more than half a century, communicated Danish literature and cultural history to a wide audience both at home and abroad.

Professor Jens-Christian Svenning from Aarhus University has been awarded the prize for his internationally acclaimed basic research spanning from macroecological processes to the development of methods and ideas for rewilding to benefit both the planet’s climate and its ecosystems. He is also a tireless pioneer in his field when it comes to developing solutions to major global social challenges resulting from climate change.

About nominating Anne-Marie Mai for the Carlsberg Foundation Research Prize, the Prize Committee writes:

Throughout her career, Mai has created new approaches and understandings of literature, not only in Denmark and the Nordic region but also in an international context. She has changed our understanding of recent periods of Danish literature, identifying a break in the mid-1960s and the emergence of a new period. In doing so, she has linked together leading bodies of work in a new way and established the concept of the “formal breakthrough”, an insight that has woven together a variety of contributions to Danish literary history. This discovery has been pivotal for Danish and Nordic literary research, and the “formal breakthrough” is now a recognised period of recent Danish literature.