The 1931 Nobel Prize in Literature was posthumously awarded to the Swedish poet Erik Axel Karlfeldt (1864–1931) with the citation: "The poetry of Erik Axel Karlfeldt." He was the third Swede to win the prize and remains the only recipient to be posthumously awarded. It has been rumored that he had been offered the award already in 1918 and 1919 but refused it, at least in part because of his position as permanent secretary to the Swedish Academy (1913–1931), which awards the prize.