Nobel author bridges Islam and the West Mark Feeney | Boston Globe | October 13, 2006
http://www.boston.com/news/world/articles/2006/10/13/nobel_author_bridges_islam_and_the_west/ Orhan Pamuk, a Turkish writer whose novels have won international acclaim and whose championing of human rights has made him a controversial figure in his homeland, was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature yesterday. ``I'm very happy and honored, I'm pleased," Pamuk told the Swedish newspaper Svenska Dagbladet. Pamuk ``has discovered new symbols for the clash and interlacing of cultures," the Swedish Academy said in its prize citation. In such novels as ``The White Castle, " ``My Name Is Red, " and ``Snow, " Pamuk has served as literary bridge between Islam and the West, fundamentalism and secularism, Ottoman past and an increasingly European present. Pamuk was prosecuted in Turkey on charges of ``insulting Turkishness" during an interview in which he criticized Turkish unwillingness to confront the government's massacre of Armenians during World War I and ongoing suppression of Kurdish separatists. The charges were dropped in January, but not before they drew widespread international condemnation. ``The public prosecutors did him a big favor, trying to silence him," Walter G. Andrews said in a telephone interview yesterday. Andrews, who teaches Near Eastern languages and civilizations at the University of Washington at Seattle, has known Pamuk for almost four decades. ``Orhan's the kind of person who gets the prize, and the kind of person who deserves the prize: a worldwide voice." News of Pamuk's selection was hailed by the Turkish Foreign Ministry. ``We congratulate our writer," the ministry said in a statement, ``and wish him continued success in his literary life." Turkish nationalists denounced the choice of Pamuk. ``This prize was not given because of Pamuk's books," said Kemal Kerincsiz, a lawyer who helped bring the charges against Pamuk. ``It was given because he belittled our national values, for his recognition of the [Armenian] genocide." Pamuk owes his fame to more than just politics. His literary credentials are impeccable. His work has been translated into 35 languages, and has received numerous literary prizes, including the prestigious IMPAC Dublin Literary Award, worth about $125,000, for his novel ``My Name Is Red" in 2003. His dense, sprawling portrait of Istanbul in his 1994 novel ``The Black Book " has earned comparisons to James Joyce's treatment of Dublin in ``Ulysses. " Yet the geopolitical factor in Pamuk's selection is hard to miss. The obvious indicator is his age. Nobelists tend to be grand old men, or women, of letters -- unless there is some extraliterary consideration at work. At 54, Pamuk is a decade or more younger than most Nobel laureates in literature. Pamuk was the first writer from an Islamic country to publicly denounce the fatwa against British novelist Salman Rushdie, and his strong stands in defense of free speech and against fundamentalism in interviews and essays have earned praise throughout the West. During a 2004 visit to Istanbul, President Bush quoted Pamuk in a speech. The Swedish Academy has a history of using the literary Nobel to make political statements. Two recent examples were the 2001 selection of British novelist V.S. Naipaul , several of whose books castigate Islamic fundamentalism, and the selection last year of English playwright Harold Pinter , an outspoken critic of the US invasion of Iraq. ``If you look at Pamuk's work in its totality, he's someone who didn't begin writing fiction with any political motive in mind," Erdag M. Goknar said in a telephone interview yesterday. ``He was strictly interested in poetics and aesthetics," said Goknar, who teaches Turkish literature at Duke University and translated ``My Name Is Red." ``Over time, beginning in the '90s, he became much more political." News of Pamuk's selection was hailed by the Turkish Foreign Ministry. ``We congratulate our writer," the ministry said in a statement, ``and wish him continued success in his literary life." Turkish nationalists denounced the choice of Pamuk. ``This prize was not given because of Pamuk's books," said Kemal Kerincsiz, a lawyer who helped bring the charges against Pamuk. ``It was given because he belittled our national values, for his recognition of the [Armenian] genocide." Pamuk owes his fame to more than just politics. His literary credentials are impeccable. His work has been translated into 35 languages, and has received numerous literary prizes, including the prestigious IMPAC Dublin Literary Award , worth about $125,000, for his novel ``My Name Is Red" in 2003. His dense, sprawling portrait of Istanbul in his 1994 novel ``The Black Book " has earned comparisons to James Joyce's treatment of Dublin in ``Ulysses. " Yet the geopolitical factor in Pamuk's selection is hard to miss. The obvious indicator is his age. Nobelists tend to be grand old men, or women, of letters -- unless there is some extraliterary consideration at work. At 54, Pamuk is a decade or more younger than most Nobel laureates in literature. Pamuk was the first writer from an Islamic country to publicly denounce the fatwa against British novelist Salman Rushdie, and his strong stands in defense of free speech and against fundamentalism in interviews and essays have earned praise throughout the West. During a 2004 visit to Istanbul, President Bush quoted Pamuk in a speech. The Swedish Academy has a history of using the literary Nobel to make political statements. Two recent examples were the 2001 selection of British novelist V.S. Naipaul , several of whose books castigate Islamic fundamentalism, and the selection last year of English playwright Harold Pinter , an outspoken critic of the US invasion of Iraq. ``If you look at Pamuk's work in its totality, he's someone who didn't begin writing fiction with any political motive in mind," Erdag M. Goknar said in a telephone interview yesterday. ``He was strictly interested in poetics and aesthetics," said Goknar, who teaches Turkish literature at Duke University and translated ``My Name Is Red." ``Over time, beginning in the '90s, he became much more political." Orhan Pamuk (pronounced OR-han PAH-mook) was born in Istanbul and grew up in a secular middle-class family. He studied painting and architecture before becoming a writer. Pamuk lived in New York City from 1985-88. An Istanbul resident, he is divorced and the father of a teenage daughter. A highly prolific writer, Pamuk prides himself on working 10-hour days, seven days a week. Other books by him include ``The New Life," a novel, and a work of nonfiction, ``Istanbul: Memories and the City." This semester Pamuk is a visiting professor at Columbia University. ``Turkey is made in such a way that the country's culture is also made of two spirits, not essentially fighting with each other but trying to find ways of combining," Pamuk said in a 2004 Boston Globe interview, discussing how he and his work reflected the polarities of his homeland. ``In that sense, I'm slightly schizophrenic -- slightly." This year's Nobel Prizes will be presented in Stockholm on Dec. 10. Each prize carries a cash award of $1.4 million. 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