Roy Jacobsen

Roy Jacobsen was a Norwegian novelist and short-story writer. Born in Oslo, he made his publishing début in 1982 with the short-story collection Fangeliv, which won Tarjei Vesaas' debutantpris. He won the Norwegian Critics Prize for Literature and the Gyldendal Prize. Two of his novels have been nominated for The Nordic Council's Literature Prize: Seierherrene in 1991 and Frost in 2004. Several of his books have been translated into English. The Unseen was shortlisted for the International Booker Prize in 2017 and he was twice shortlisted for the International Dublin Literary Award.

Life and career

Jacobsen grew up in a suburb of Oslo located in the Groruddalen valley. In his teens, Jacobsen was a member of the criminal "Årvoll gang". At age 16 he was arrested by the police and kept in solitary confinement for 35 days. He was subsequently convicted of among other things weapons offences and theft, and given a six-month suspended sentence.
He held a number of occupations, even after his debut as a writer in 1982. From 1990 he was a full-time author. Between 1979 and 1986 he lived at his mother's homestead at Solfjellsjøen in Dønna Municipality in the northern Norwegian county of Nordland, and both his mother's background and his own upbringing in Groruddalen were central themes of his breakthrough novel Seierherrene in 1991. He was a member of the Norwegian Academy for Language and Literature.
Jacobsen lived in Oslo in the later decades of his life. He died from complications of surgery on 18 October 2025, at the age of 70.