ABDULRAZAK GURNAH OF TANZANIA WINS THE NOBEL PRIZE IN LITERATURE IN 2021

Thu 07 October 2021:

The Nobel Prize in Literature for 2021 has been awarded to Tanzanian novelist Abdulrazak Gurnah, according to the award-giving organization.

The prestigious prize was awarded on Thursday by the Swedish Academy, which cited Gurnah’s “uncompromising and compassionate penetration of the effects of colonialism and the fate of the refugee in the gulf between cultures and continents”.

Gurnah, who was born in Zanzibar and now lives in England, just retired as a post-colonial literary professor at the University of Kent.

He’s written ten novels and a collection of short stories. He is best known for his 1994 novel “Paradise,” which was shortlisted for the Booker Prize for Fiction and is set in colonial East Africa during World War I.

In the kitchen of his house in southeast England, Gurnah received a call from the Swedish Academy.

“I think it’s just brilliant and wonderful,” Gurnah told Reuters news agency when asked how he felt to win the prize. “It’s just great – its just a big prize, and such a huge list of wonderful writers – I am still taking it in,” he said.

“It was such a complete surprise that I really had to wait until I heard it announced before I could believe it.”

Anders Olsson, chairman of the Nobel Committee for Literature, called him “one of the world’s most prominent post-colonial writers”.

The prestigious award comes with a gold medal and 10 million Swedish kronor ($1.14m).

Last year’s prize went to American poet Louise Gluck for what the judges described as her “unmistakable poetic voice that with austere beauty makes individual existence universal”.

Still to come are prizes for outstanding work in the fields of peace and economics.

(with agencies)

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