US singer Bob Dylan, who became an informal historian of America's troubles, on Thursday won the 2016 Nobel Prize for Literature.
The 75 - year - old rock legend received the prize "for having created new poetic expressions within the great American song tradition", BBC reported.
Dylan was born Robert Allen Zimmerman in 1941 and began his musical career in 1959, playing in coffee houses in Minnesota.
Much of his best - known work dates from the 1960s.
Songs like "Blowin' in the Wind" and "The Times They are A - Changin'" became anthems of the anti - war and civil rights movements.
His move away from traditional folk songwriting, paired with a controversial decision to "go electric" proved equally influential, BBC reported.