US singer Bob Dylan has been awarded the 2016 Nobel Prize for Literature, the BBC reported on Thursday.

The 75-year-old rock legend received the prize "for having created new poetic expressions within the great American song tradition".

The balladeer, artist and occasional actor is the first songwriter to win the prestigious award.

The performer - who took his stage name from the poet Dylan Thomas - is the first American to win the award since novelist Toni Morrison in 1993.

Source: MENA