Nobel Prize

Jean-Marie Gustave Le Clézio has said that the French language is the only place where he feels a sense of belonging. He is someone who has always lived on the edge, and in-between, and is hard to identify with a single locality. Itinerant from childhood, he has continued to travel, and now divides his time…

Doris Lessing’s career, like that of Mario Capecchi, another 2007 Nobel Laureate, shows that a strict pattern of formal schooling is not the only way to success. Lessing was born in Persia (now Iran), to British parents, but her family moved to Southern Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) in hope of a better future. However, that future…

In this age of mass media, mass movement, and globalization it is likely that we will confront different cultures and different races as we go about our daily business. But Turkey, which straddles the intersection of East and West, has always had to deal with the problems and pleasures of diversity. The best-selling Turkish novelist…

Swedish Har ni sett en koltramp … Har ni sett en koltramp komma ur en orkan – med bräckta bommar, sönderslitna relingar, bucklig, stånkande, förfelad – och med en skeppare som är alldeles hes? Fnysande lägger den till vid den soliga kajen, utmattad slickande sina sår, medan ångan tynar i pannorna. Av Harry Martinson Ur…

On 27 November 1895, Alfred Nobel signed his last will and testament, giving the largest share of his fortune to a series of prizes, the Nobel Prizes. As described in Nobel’s will one part was dedicated to “the person who shall have produced in the field of literature the most outstanding work in an ideal…

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Swedish Presentationstal av professor Sara Danius, Ständige Sekreterare, ledamot i Nobelkommittén för litteratur, 10 december 2017. Eders Majestäter, Eders Kungliga Högheter, excellenser, mina damer och herrar! Några sidor in i romanen When We Were Orphans (2000) får huvudpersonen en present.…

English Presentation Speech by Professor Sara Danius, Permanent Secretary of the , Member of the Nobel Committee for Literature, 10 December 2017. Your Majesties, Your Royal Highnesses, Your Excellencies, Ladies and Gentlemen,…

Kazuo Ishiguro’s speech at the Nobel Banquet, 10 December 2017. Your Majesties, your Royal Highnesses, ladies and gentlemen. I remember vividly the large face of a foreigner, a Western man, illustrated in rich colours, dominating the whole page of my book. Behind this looming face, to one side, was smoke and dust from an…

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