Belarusian journalist and author Svetlana Alexievich, as well as the bookies’ favourite to take the title, has been awarded the 2015 Nobel Prize in Literature.
Announcing the prize in Stockholm this morning, the chairwoman of the prestigious Swedish Academy, Sara Danius, acclaimed Alexievich’s prose as a “polyphonic writings, monument to suffering and courage in our time.”
The writer, 67, whose best known works in English include Voices from Chernobyl and Zinky Boys, a collection of oral histories about the nuclear disaster and the Russian involvement in Afghanistan, is only the 14th woman to claim literature’s top accolade in the 111-year history of the Nobel Prize.
But Alexeivich's non-fiction books, written in Russian, remain unpublished in her home country of Belarus, where the writer has warned of "a creeping censorship" instigated by the long-ruling authoritarian president Alexander Lukashenko.
But her books, controversially written in Russian, are not published in her home country, long ruled by authoritarian President Alexander Lukashenko, amid what the author has described as "a creeping censorship".
Alexievich now takes home the sum of eight million Swedish kronor (around €860,000).
The last woman to win was Canadian short-story writer Alice Munro, who was awarded the prize in 2013.
The names of the writers in the final running for the prize is always a closely-guarded secret, kept by the Swedish Academy. The group accepts suggestions from academic institutions and former winners, which this year numbered 220 names – and it has long been believed that no writer can win the prize upon his or her first nomination.
In May, the Academy whittled down the unspecified long list to five, and the works of these writers have been scrutinised over the last few months by the members on the jury.
The winner is informed by telephone that he or she has won half an hour before the public announcement. Commenting on how Alexievich reacted to the news, Permanent Secretary Sara Danius told reporters that she expressed delight, and that her exact comment was “Fantastic!”
When she finally understood who was calling her... #NobelPrize http://t.co/tuNloAPFiR
— The Nobel Prize (@NobelPrize) October 8, 2015
Alexievich’s victory is believed to have come at the expense of Ireland’s John Banville, who was among the writers with the shortest odds in betting circles. Others in that group include Haruki Murakami of Japan, Kenya’s NgÅ©gÄ© wa Thiong’o, Norwegian playwright Jon Fosse, and American writers Joyce Carol Oates and Philip Roth.
Four Irish writers have previously been awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature; WB Yeats (1923), George Bernard Shaw (1925), Samuel Beckett (1969), and Seamus Heaney (1995). In total, 10 Irishmen and women have claimed one of the prizes, including William Campbell, who this year won for Medicine.
