The Swedish Academy awarded the 2024 Nobel Prize in Literature to South Korean creator Han Kang, recognizing her “intense poetic prose that confronts historic traumas and exposes the fragility of human life.”
This prestigious award marks a major second for Asian literature on the world stage.
Born in 1970 in Gwangju, South Korea, Han Kang has gained worldwide recognition for her highly effective and evocative writings. Her work typically delves into the complicated interaction between private and collective trauma, drawing on historic occasions and exploring their lasting impression on people and society.
One in every of Han’s most notable works, “Human Acts” (2014), exemplifies his method to literature. The novel has its roots within the precise Gwangju rebellion of 1980, the place a whole lot of scholars and unarmed civilians have been killed. By weaving collectively a number of narratives, Han creates a haunting portrait of violence, resilience, and reminiscence.
The Nobel Committee famous Han’s distinctive potential to mix the bodily and psychological features of human struggling in his writings. This “double publicity of ache” is a recurring theme in his work, typically drawing connections with Jap philosophical traditions.
Han’s brief story “Europe” (2012) additional shows his literary prowess. The narrative explores themes of identification, need, and the impossibility of true achievement, demonstrating Han’s potential to create complicated characters and thought-provoking situations.
The creator’s most internationally acknowledged work, “The Vegetarian” (2007), beforehand gained the Man Booker Worldwide Prize in 2016. This novel, like a lot of Han’s work, examines the boundaries between physique and self, violence and peace.
Han Kang’s Nobel Prize not solely celebrates his particular person achievements but additionally brings larger consideration to modern Korean literature. As the primary Korean-born creator to obtain this honor, her recognition is prone to open doorways for different Asian writers on the world stage.
The Nobel Prize in Literature, accompanied by a financial award of 11 million Swedish crowns (roughly $1 million), will probably be awarded to Han Kang at a ceremony in Stockholm on December 10, 2024.
The Nobel Prize in Literature has been awarded 116 instances to 120 Nobel laureates between 1901 and 2023.
Beforehand, the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences introduced the winners of the Nobel Prize in Physics and Chemistry.
The 2024 Nobel bulletins started with the Medication Prize awarded to Victor Ambros and Gary Ruvkun for the invention of microRNA and its function in post-transcriptional gene regulation.