Joseph Brodsky (24 May 1940 - 28 January 1996) was a Russian and American poet and essayist. In 1986, his collection of essays Less Than One won the National Book Critics Award for Criticism and he was given an honorary doctorate of literature from Oxford University. He was awarded the 1987 Nobel Prize in Literature 《for an all-embracing authorship, imbued with clarity of thought and poetic intensity》. In an interview he was asked: 《You are an American citizen who is receiving the Prize for Russian-language poetry. Who are you, an American or a Russian?》 《I?m Jewish; a Russian poet, an English essayist - and, of course, an American citizen》, he responded.