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| A NOBEL PRIZE AGAINST COMMUNISM 09/10/2009 |
| (2009-10-09) |
| Last updated: 2009-10-12 13:27 EET |
“I am very surprised and I still can't believe it.” That was one of the first statements made by Romanian-born German writer Herta Muller, winner of the 2009 Nobel Prize for Literature. The “concentration of poetry and the frankness of prose with which she depicts the landscape of the dispossessed” are the qualities for which the Nobel Committee chose to offer the prestigious award to Herta Muller, at the expense of writers such as Amos Oz, Mario Vargas Llosa or Salman Rushdie. Peter Englund, permanent secretary of the Swedish Academy, referred to the writer's Romanian past, stating that, quote: “ to Herta Muller, who had to flee her home country, the past is still alive.
She has an incredibly intense and honest writing style”, end of quote. Nora Iuga, who has translated most of Herta Muller's books into Romanian, shares the same opinion, quote: “Regardless of its genre, each book by the German writer born in the Romanian Banat region carries the imprint of secret terror, which cannot be erased from her memory. In her books, the Securitate is not only the feared repression tool of Romania's former communist regime. It takes all forms of human evil, from humiliation and harassment to fear, torture and death. In Herta Muller's books, the evil is heralded by each and every detail of the surrounding world: there are secret messages in plants, in objects, in daily rituals, there are secret languages that she alone can make out.” In an interview on Radio Romania Culture Channel, the fresh winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature once said:
“I didn't win over the West, I am simply one of the many writers of some popularity in Germany. I’ve worked hard, that's all. And I've only written about the things that have been on my mind. There are no good or bad topics, there are well written or badly written topics. And I believe all topics are good if you write them well. I don't know whether I've written well, this is not a matter of choice or of decision. It's something that happens or doesn't happen. And maybe I've also been very lucky.”
The writer, who fled communist Romania and has been living in Berlin for 22 years now, has retained a critical tone and has carried on her fight against the Securitate and communist terror, not only in her writings, but also in her public shows. “Post-communist Romania has not yet discarded all the masks of communist horror, the most deceptive of which is the mask of denouncement, and the most terrible - the annihilation of privacy,” Herta Muller wrote in “Die Zeit”. One of the first personalities to congratulate the writer after the award announcement was German chancellor Angela Merkel, quote: “I am very happy with the Nobel Committee's decision to reward Herta Muller with this prize, because she is one of those writers who truly deserve it.” end of quote. Literary critic Nicolae Manolescu, president of the Romanian Writers' Union, also said:
“Herta Muller is not a Romanian writer, but only a writer born in Romania. The talks around her and her books might draw some attention to the Romanian literature. And in this case, the translations of contemporary Romanian literature available in Western bookshops might get some more attention. That would be great.”
Horia Roman Patapievici, president of the Romanian Cultural Institute, believes the awarding of the 2009 Nobel for literature has “a special meaning for Romania”, in that it indicates that Committee members meant to mark 20 years since the fall of communism in Eastern Europe.
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2025-04-03
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