Korean novelist Han Kang has become the first Korean to win the Nobel Prize in Literature.
The Swedish Academy announced, Thursday, that Han, 53, was the winner of the prestigious prize.
She is the second Korean Nobel laureate, following former President Kim Dae-jung, who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2000 for his efforts to promote peace on the Korean Peninsula. Additionally, she is the first Asian woman to receive the Nobel Prize in Literature.
Selecting the writer of the 2016 International Booker Prize-winning novel “The Vegetarian,” the academy said in a press release, “The Nobel Prize in Literature for 2024 is awarded to South Korean author Han Kang for her intense poetic prose that confronts historical traumas and exposes the fragility of human life.”
“In her oeuvre, Han Kang confronts historical traumas and invisible sets of rules and, in each of her works, exposes the fragility of human life,” the academy added.
“She has a unique awareness of the connections between body and soul, the living and the dead, and in her poetic and experimental style has become an innovator in contemporary prose,” Anders Olsson, chairman of the academy’s Nobel Committee, said in a statement.
The winner of the Nobel Prize will receive 11 million krona (around $1 million), along with medals and certificates.
The Nobel Prize in Literature has been awarded 117 times to 121 individuals since 1901. Han is the first Korean to receive the prize and the 18th female writer to be honored with this award
Since 2012, the Nobel Prize in Literature has alternated between male and female recipients almost without exception. With Han’s win, this tradition 스포츠 continues, following last year’s winner, Jon Fosse of Norway. This also marks the first time an Asian writer has received the prize since Chinese author Mo Yan in 2012.
Han has already established herself firmly in the global literary scene, having secured the Booker Prize and becoming the first Korean author to achieve this honor. The Booker Prize is considered one of the world’s top three literary awards, alongside the Nobel Prize and the Prix Goncourt.