namelesshere
Reader
Given the ubiquity of American culture, particularly in the UK, that observation doesn't surprise me.
Nobel Prize in Literature 2022
- Thread starter Stewart
- Start date
Given the ubiquity of American culture, particularly in the UK, that observation doesn't surprise me.
Well, her name pops up in Poland from time to time for a few years now but she had just two novels translated into Polish (and one of them was published just this year). So I wouldn't say that she's 'famous' here. But surely more 'famous' than Gluck and Gurnah.
But from all winners of the last 20 years only Svetlana Alexievich, Kazuo Ishiguro and - obviously - Olga Tokarczuk were widely published in Poland in the time when they won the Nobel Prize. The rest didn't have anything translated (like Gluck, Gurnah) or wasn't translated and published for years (like Handke) or just had few titles translated, somewhat available (like Munro). So the publishing market in Poland isn't the best to judge someone's fame.
Patrick Murtha
Reader
You with the authors, dude! Very impressed. ?
Leseratte
Well-known member
I do count him as an European. But I don´t disregard his Japanese roots. Clarice Lispector went the opposite way. She was born in the Ukraine and emigrated as a child with her family to Brazil and acquired the Brazilian citizenship. Her themes are usually very Brazilian, but she brought to the Brazilian literature a kind of introspective fiction that was totally unusual here and that enriched Brazilian literature tremendously and that probably points to her Ukrainian
roots.
The problem with Ishiguro is, that every time I mention his Japanese influence, some people in this forum seem to think I´m downgrading him. I am not. I´m just taking into account this influence without which his evaluation would be incomplete.
Patrick Murtha
Reader
Am I the only one who thinks there is similarity between Ernaux and Margeurite Duras? Female experience, sparse style, short novels, autobiographical writing (of course, not the case with all of Duras' books).
Dammit, now I remembered how other French woman named Marguerite, Yourcenar, was robbed from her Nobel
I haven’t read anything by Ernaux yet, but I can confidently state that she has deep roots in French literature, which since I’m a literary history type, always delights me. You point out one; in the new Ernaux thread I brought up her acknowledged debt to Flaubert.
“Writing degree zero” has not got that much of a tradition in the English language, so Anglophone readers are often puzzled / put off by their first exposure to this type of French literature.
Hamishe22
Well-known member
Japanese literature is so great. I, personally, much prefer it to European literature. You're upgrading him.
Leseratte
Well-known member
It´s a very objective note!
Stevie B
Current Member
What troubles me more is the large number of Americans who don't know what's happening in America - for example, the high percentage of people who think January 6th was a peaceful protest DESPITE video evidence to the contrary.
Leseratte
Well-known member
Indeed, but a ubiquity that one can perhaps protest against, disengage from, or simply ignore. Interestingly enough, younger people here are less captivated by America than the older generation, thanks to social media.
hayden
Well-known member
Maybe I need to start writing people letters.
Anyway, watched it live— very happy with the choice, zero complaints.
Considering she was in my top three guesses to win the prize, I'm also going to give myself a pat on the back ?
(Albeit, she's probably the least surprising winner in quite some time)
Little tied up right now, but I'll get around to reading everyone's reactions later today.
Will note, the automated subtitles for the announcement were outright abysmal to a point of hilarity.
Stevie B
Current Member
See what happens when I can't watch TV? I read more and find other productive things to do with my time. I wrote to authors as a hobby, but I only did so while I was teaching in Japan. I think my uncommon return address increased the percentage of authors who took the time to reply.
Patrick Murtha
Reader
Not to derail the thread, but:
“The Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command.”
Papageno
Well-known member
Talking of Yourcenar, here is an interview with Annie Ernaux from 2017 when she received prix Marguerite Yourcenar in which she recalls how, on the evening after receiving the very prestigious Prix Renaudot she was dining with her publisher in a hotel and saw Yourcenar "avec son écharpe blanche" at another table further down the dining hall, smiling at her "with curiosity and amusement." This seems as such a typical Ernaux moment: trying to reconstruct a memory of a smile...Dammit, now I remembered how other French woman named Marguerite, Yourcenar, was robbed from her Nobel
Stevie B
Current Member
I've always agreed with this sentiment. Parents trump geography. I had a friend in college who grew up overseas, mostly in Thailand, and who didn't live in the U.S. until college. Of course, she had different perspectives because of her life experience, but she was as American as the rest of us in her mind and ours.
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Stevie B
Current Member
Prophetic words, I'm sad to say.
I think I posted this before, but the man himself acknowledges this:
“I’m not entirely like English people because I’ve been brought up by Japanese parents in a Japanese-speaking home. My parents didn’t realize that we were going to stay in this country for so long, they felt responsible for keeping me in touch with Japanese values. I do have a distinct background. I think differently, my perspectives are slightly different.”
BOMB Magazine | Kazuo Ishiguro
"Memory is this terribly treacherous terrain, the very ambiguities of memory go to feed self-deception. And so quite often, we have situations where the license of the person to keep inventing versions of what happened in the past is rapidly beginning to run out. The results of one’s life, the…
bombmagazine.org
Seelig
Active member
Oh, Yourcenar… one of the greatest. Beyond, well beyond the Nobel, as Proust, Céline, Perec…
Patrick Murtha
Reader
My cat Frida, who’s into French literature, approves of this year’s selection!
