The Nobel Prize in Literature 1915 was awarded to Romain Rolland "as a tribute to the lofty idealism of his literary production and to the sympathy and love of truth with which he has described different types of human beings".

Romain Rolland received his Nobel Prize one year later, in 1916. During the selection process in 1915, the Nobel Committee for Literature decided that none of the year's nominations met the criteria as outlined in the will of Alfred Nobel. According to the Nobel Foundation's statutes, the Nobel Prize can in such a case be reserved until the following year, and this statute was then applied. Romain Rolland therefore received his Nobel Prize for 1915 one year later, in 1916.