I have not admitted this before, but I must confess that I bear some responsibility for the decision. 

In my role as unofficial consultant to the Nobel committee, my opinions are often sought on whether certain nominees deserve the honour of a prize and last year was a case in point.

The phone rang with an unmistakably Swedish accent before I picked it up and, after instructing me to press the ‘scrambler’ button (which I must admit was a bit soiled as I had used it for the morning’s eggs), the anonymous voice explained that he was researching for the Nobels and he asked me how many roads, in my opinion, a man must walk down before you call him a man. 

“Does that include streets, avenues, crescents and other highways,” I asked, “and are we restricting it to made-up roads or do you include any dirt-tracks or pathways that permit vehicular access?” 

There was a pause, after which the fellow said, “I’ll call you back.” 

True to his word, he did so only minutes later.

“A road,” he said, “is a hard surface leading from one place to another.” 

“So we’re excluding cul-de-sacs,” I said. 

Then I added, “or culs-de-sac or culs-des-sacs, opinions are divided on the correct plural.

“It is unlikely that a man would walk down a cul-de-sac,” he said. 

“Not if he was going somewhere anyway, unless it was to visit a friend who lived in the cul-de-sac or he lived there himself. I think we can therefore exclude cul-de-sacs and the other plurals, though perhaps include them in a footnote.” 

“Good idea,” I said.

“Now to get back to your original question, let me get this right. What you want to know is how many roads, streets, lanes, broadways, places, squares and the like, excluding cul-de-sacs and other plurals thereof except in a footnote, a man must walk down before you call him a man. Is that right?” 

“No,” he said. 

“What I asked is how many roads he must walk down before YOU call him a man, not before I call him a man. I have already called him a man in the first half of the question.” 

“So to clarify,” I said: “what you want to know, is how many roads someone you already consider to be a man must walk down before I too categorise him as a man.”

“Correct,” he said. 

“I’d have thought two would do it,” I said after thinking it over, “as long as the roads are not too short and the fellow does not have a particularly effeminate walk.”

“I see,” he said. 

“So the answer, you would say, is not blowing in the wind.” 

“I don’t see how it can be,” I said. 

“Leaves and dust and scraps of paper may be blowing in the wind, but I don’t think you’ll find the answer there.” 

“So would you say we should not award a Prize to someone who firmly asserts the answer is wind-blown.”

“Not a science or economics prize,” I said, “though I suppose a Literature prize is not out of the question, citing poetic licence for the error.” 

And that, I fear, is how it happened.