8 Oct 2009 17:08 Africa/Lagos

University of Nebraska Press Author Recipient of 2009 Nobel Prize for Literature

LINCOLN, Neb., Oct. 8 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- German writer Herta Muller, whose short story collection Nadirs was published by the University of Nebraska Press in 1999, is the winner of this year's Nobel Prize for Literature.


Muller was born in 1953 in the Banat, a German-language region of Romania, and the stories of Nadirs are based on her experiences growing up there. Nadirs, Muller's first published work, was originally published in Romania under the title Niederungen in a censored format. The complete manuscript was smuggled to Germany in 1984 and published in full. Muller herself immigrated to West Berlin in 1987. She has received numerous literary awards, including the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award.


Nadirs, which was published as part of the University of Nebraska Press' European Woman Writers series, is one of just five of Muller's books available in English. The stories in Nadirs, told from the standpoint of a young girl, weave together a bleak picture of Banat, where violence and poverty are rampant, and the vivid dreams of the narrator. The judges praised this unique writing style, saying "with the concentration of poetry and the frankness of prose, (Muller) depicts the landscape of the dispossessed."


Muller is the second University of Nebraska Press author to win the Nobel Prize for Literature in as many years. Last year's winner, J. M. G. Le Clezio, has published a short story collection, The Round and Other Cold Hard Facts, and a novel, Onitsha, with the University of Nebraska Press. Another of Le Clezio's short story collections, Mondo and Other Stories, is forthcoming from the University of Nebraska Press next year.


Muller will receive her prize at a Dec. 10 ceremony in Stockholm, Sweden.


About the University of Nebraska Press: Founded in 1941, the University of Nebraska Press (UNP) is a nonprofit scholarly and general interest press that publishes 160 new and reprint titles annually under the Nebraska and Bison Books imprints respectively, along with 20 journals. As the largest and most diversified university press between Chicago and California, with nearly 3,000 books in print, the University of Nebraska Press is best known for publishing works in Indigenous studies, history and literature of the American West, literary translation, and sports history. UNP has also had a long-standing dedication to making available the best literature from around the world. With nearly 200 translated titles currently in print from five different languages, including two titles by J.M.G. Le Clezio, the 2008 winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature and one title by the 2009 winner, Herta Muller, the number and breadth of translated titles has distinguished UNP as one of the largest, most active American publishers of translated work. UNP's translations and other titles have won numerous awards, and the press as a whole was named ForeWord Magazine's Independent Press of the Year for 2008.


A distinctive member of the University of Nebraska community, UNP supports the missions of research, teaching, and service. In addition, UNP's sustained commitment to publications on the peoples, culture, and heritage of Nebraska reflects decades of service to its home state. Learn more about UNP at www.nebraskapress.unl.edu.


Source: University of Nebraska Press

CONTACT: Cara Pesek, Publicity Manager, University of Nebraska Press,
+1-402-472-7710, cpesek2@unl.edu


Web Site: http://www.nebraskapress.unl.edu/

is this Nobel now the same as the commonwealth short story competition? i think the criteria has fallen. . . .