Nobel Prize in Literature 2006

Department of I told you so: The 2006 Nobel Prize in Literature has been awarded to Orhan Pamuk, “who in the quest for the melancholic soul of his native city has discovered new symbols for the clash and interlacing of cultures.” It’s clear the judges have been sensitive to all the recent controversies that have been framed as exemplars of an age-old “clash of civilizations,” but they also understand that it’s not an inevitable state, since they’ve at least added the word “interlacing.” And Pamuk himself is not one for essentialist views, as you can see from this lovely essay he wrote for the New York Review of Books in November 2001: “The Anger of the Damned.”

In any case, this is a wonderful and richly deserved distinction, and I couldn’t be more pleased. You can find all of Pamuk’s recent books online or at your favorite bookshop: My Name Is Red, Snow, The White Castle, The Black Book, and his most recent, a memoir, Istanbul: Memories of the City.

Some Pamuk-related links:
Orhan Pamuk goes on trial
Pamuk update
Pamuk in trouble?
The MG review of Snow
Orhan Pamuk on Istanbul

Photo: M. Euler/Scanpix