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2008 Nobel Prize in Literature

beer good

beer good

Well-Known Member
Well, it's getting towards that time again. It'll most likely be announced sometime over the next two weeks, and Ladbrokes has put up its odds (which pretty much look the same as for the past few years, since they are just wild guesses):

Claudio Magris 4.00
Adonis 5.00
Amos Oz 6.00
Joyce Carol Oates 8.00
Philip Roth 8.00
Don DeLillo 11.00
Haruki Murakami 11.00
Les Murray 11.00
Yves Bonnefoy 11.00
Arnošt Lustig 15.00

So, guesses, anyone? Are they going to stay on the popular side (the last three winners - Pinter, Pamuk, Lessing - weren't exactly obscure) or are they going to go for a dark horse again? Prose, poetry, non-fiction? Will people be complaining that they've never heard of the winner even if it's Stephen King? (Well, people will be complaining anyway, so...)
 
The only three I have been reading lately are Roth, DeLillo and Murakami, so I'm resigned to it being someone else.:)
 
Peder said:
The only three I have been reading lately are Roth, DeLillo and Murakami, so I'm resigned to it being someone else.:)
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I'm just an on-looker, but the only ones I have read at all have been Oats, Roth, DeLillo and Murakami. Murakami is a recent experience (Kafka on the Shore) and I am very impressed.
 
silverseason said:
I'm just an on-looker, but the only ones I have read at all have been Oats, Roth, DeLillo and Murakami. Murakami is a recent experience (Kafka on the Shore) and I am very impressed.
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'Life's accomplishment' might well go to Roth, who in many ways reminds me of Doris Lessing, or vice versa - social and political themes.

'Innovative' would argue for DeLillo and Murakami, and Kafka on the Shore is right here waiting for me. Sounds like I should bump it up.

Joyce Carol Oates I read so long ago that I have forgotten everything about it.

But, to name one: Roth.
 
A few thoughts:

Chinua Achebe is getting on a bit. With the (slowly but surely) growing interest in African literature, he'd be a fitting choice - as would Ngugi wa Thiong'o.

How about Gitta Sereny? It's been a very long time since a non-fiction author got it, and her writings certainly haven't gotten any less topical in recent years...

Rushdie or Eco would be deserving winners, but I doubt it. I'd be more likely to put money on someone like Kundera or Tabucchi...

It's been a while since an American got it, but given some comments by the Academy secretary, I doubt the big names like Roth or Oates are in the running. But how about Didion? Or they could just give it to Pynchon or Salinger and save a few bucks, since they wouldn't show up for the award ceremony... :)
 
I have been really impressed by all i read from Andrei Makine,as an underdog,but Roth seems more plausible.Eco would deserve but might be a bit to "cheerful" for the Jury.
Amin Maalouf is a remarkable author,unfairly unknowed by English circles at a time were is books creat a link betwin orient and occident.
Cormac McCarthy ?Too hard boiled?
The only thing against Roth is the obviousness of the choice that might weight against him.
 
I think I'm swaying toward Arnošt Lustig winning the prize. I would be happy with it being Makine, Ugresic, Eco, Roth, or Achebe.

For purely selfish reasons, I'd like a novelist to win, since I'd be more likely to read that person's output, but if it were to be a poet, I would like the Academy to recognise Tomas Tranströmer. I've not read him, but looking over the list of laureates, the Academy haven't given the prize to any Scandinavian, let alone a Swede, since the controversy in 1974 with Martinson and Johnson. It's over with, move on, and if he means so much, recognise it.
 
One potential Nobel laureate officially drops out of the running. Paavo Haavikko, the Finnish poet and playwright, died yesterday, aged 77.
 
I got a hold of Le Clezio's Terra Amata at the library and pretty much finished it in one sitting. I've got about 30 pages to go, but unless something very bad happens, I'm quite impressed. My initial reaction is Perec meets Lispector.
 
antony48 said:
Nobel Prize in Literature - 50% is a political award, 50% - is a literature award.
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I wasn't aware there was an explicit percentage assigned. Can you provide a source for such a claim?

But, with th prize being awarded to the writer who was has produced the most idealistic work, it's little surprise that politics gets a look-in from time to time.
 
OK. Do you hear something about Joseph Brodsky, Russian poet, who won the 1987 Nobel Prize in Literature, or Naguib Mahfouz, Egyptian novelist, who won the 1988, or Ferit Orhan Pamuk, Turkish novelist, who won the 2006?
 
beer good said:
A few thoughts:

Chinua Achebe is getting on a bit. With the (slowly but surely) growing interest in African literature, he'd be a fitting choice - as would Ngugi wa Thiong'o.

How about Gitta Sereny? It's been a very long time since a non-fiction author got it, and her writings certainly haven't gotten any less topical in recent years...

Rushdie or Eco would be deserving winners, but I doubt it. I'd be more likely to put money on someone like Kundera or Tabucchi...

It's been a while since an American got it, but given some comments by the Academy secretary, I doubt the big names like Roth or Oates are in the running. But how about Didion? Or they could just give it to Pynchon or Salinger and save a few bucks, since they wouldn't show up for the award ceremony... :)
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I would love to see Rushdie take it also (if only he was considered).
 
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