Who is the world’s only POGGN winner?
Winning an award for your art is something that all creatives dream of. Having made something that is deemed worthy of recognition for its brilliance by an esteemed group of experts and connoisseurs is perhaps the greatest form of praise one can receive for a body of work. And when it comes to the world of the arts, there are plenty of accolades that rank highly in terms of desirability.
The world of cinema has plenty of awards that are coveted by the stars, filmmakers and the people behind the pictures—so much so that when some of them are grouped together, it’s considered to be a most impressive feat. First of all, there’s the ‘triple crown of acting’, which consists of winning an Oscar, an Emmy, and a Tony Award, and is a celebration of those who have contributed outstanding performances in film, television and stage.
Only 24 people can claim to have achieved this hat trick, and even more impressive is the list of people who have an ‘Egot’, which adds the Grammys as an extra prize to tick off. This elite group stretches beyond just acting performances to music as well and has been achieved by 27 people throughout history. However, there isn’t an acronym for individuals who have achieved exclusively in the world of music, despite the Grammys and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame ranking among the most desirable awards in this field.
While it’s perhaps an unwieldy title to have, there is the POGGN, which is a multidisciplinary list of accolades that one may be able to achieve in a variety of fields. This consists of the Pulitzer Prize, an award given in the field of literature; the Oscars, the Grammys; the Golden Globes, which also celebrate film and television, and the Nobel Prize, which can be awarded for various categories of achievement such as science, literature and humanitarian efforts. However, there’s not a huge push for an acronym for this haul of awards, as only one person can claim to have won all five.
So, who is the only POGGN winner?
The only person to have achieved a clean sweep in all five of these awards ceremonies is the acclaimed singer-songwriter and folk legend Bob Dylan, and when you think about it for long enough, this totally makes sense. Having had an illustrious career in music, it would be a shock to hear that he hadn’t won a Grammy Award, but considering his works have been used in film, and that his love of the written word has always been a significant part of his artistry, the other awards shouldn’t come as a surprise either.
Predictably, the Grammy was the first in the set that Dylan was able to tick off, and he’s done it on multiple occasions. Having ten to his name, as well as a special honour of the ‘Lifetime Achievement Award’, he celebrated his first win in 1973 for his contribution to the live album, The Concert For Bangladesh, which won the ‘Album of the Year’. He won in this category in his own right in 1998 for his album Time Out of Mind.
His next two awards came in the same calendar year, and both were awarded for the same work. Winning both the Oscar and Golden Globe for ‘Things Have Changed’, which featured in the film Wonder Boys, Dylan can claim to have won ‘Best Original Song’ in both of these ceremonies in 2001; although, the more remarkable slice of information about this is that these remain his one and only nominations for both awards.
His recognition for the Pulitzer Prize would come in 2008 when the awarding body presented him with an award for ‘special citations’, where works do not fit into the traditional categories honoured by judges. Joining only a select few other musicians who have won a Pulitzer, such as John Coltrane, Thelonious Monk and Duke Ellington, they honoured Dylan for “his profound impact on popular music and American culture, marked by lyrical compositions of extraordinary poetic power.”
To cap it all off, his Nobel Prize for literature in 2016 is perhaps the most unique of all, being the only musician to have been decorated with this specific honour. The voting body concluded that his victory was “for having created new poetic expressions within the great American song tradition,” which is something that can’t be argued considering his impact and influence on modern music.
There are very few other musicians who can claim to even be close to having this sweep of awards. Given how unprecedented his Nobel Prize was as a musician, it’s unlikely that this will ever be repeated by another artist, at least not for some time.
Never Miss A Tale
The Far Out Bob Dylan Newsletter
All the latest stories about Bob Dylan from the independent voice of culture.
Straight to your inbox.