10 contemporary books from Nobel laureates

2024 Author: Malcolm Clapton | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 03:44

For more than a hundred years, the Nobel Committee on Literature has been recommending noteworthy creators to readers. Lifehacker compiled a list of Nobel Prize-winning authors' books. It includes works that have been published in Russian over the past years.

1. "Red-haired Woman", Orhan Pamuk

• Country of residence of the author: Turkey.
• Book format: novel.
• Year of publication of the book in Russian: 2016.

Eighties. A young well digger searches for water in dry ground near Istanbul. Here the young man meets his first love - the red-haired actress of the itinerant theater. But a sudden tragedy changes his life. Only 30 years later, the guy will be able to understand what really happened to him in those days.

2. "Night Grass" by Patrick Modiano

• Country of residence of the author: France.
• Book format: novel.
• Year of publication of the book in Russian: 2016.

The main character recalls Paris during the Algerian War, where he met a girl with a mysterious past. A chance acquaintance entangled him in a series of dangerous intrigues, which, even half a century later, do not allow him to forget about that fateful episode in life.

3. "A Woman from Nowhere" by Gustave Leclezio

• Country of residence of the author: France, Mauritius.
• Book format: collection.
• Year of publication of the book in Russian: 2016.

The book includes two stories. The first is about the experiences of a man who has become a passive witness to rape. Only a resident of a small island can free him from the pangs of conscience and restore the lost peace. The second tells about the difficult fate of a girl, deprived of parental love and position in society since childhood.

4. "The Childhood of Jesus" by John Coetzee

• Country of residence of the author: South Africa.
• Book format: novel.
• Year of publication of the book in Russian: 2015.

The boy David and his guardian Simon arrive in an unfamiliar country, where they receive new names and new lives. Not knowing the local customs and language, two refugees are trying to find their place in a foreign world for them, and at the same time the lost mother of David.

5. "Grannies" by Doris Lessing

• Country of residence of the author: Great Britain.
• Book format: collection.
• Year of publication of the book in Russian: 2014.

A collection of four short stories, very different in content and form. The works touch on the themes of maturity, love, race relations, politics and even war. The story "Grandmothers" formed the basis of the film "Secret Attraction", filmed in 2013.

6. "More precious than life itself," Alice Munroe

• Country of residence of the author: Canada.
• Book format: collection.
• Year of publication of the book in Russian: 2014.

Alice Munroe has been hailed as one of the best short story writers today. Her new collection includes more than 10 works written primarily for reading women. In his work, Munroe addresses the typical problems in relationships, career and family, familiar to everyone.

7. "Change" by Mo Yan

• Country of residence of the author: PRC.
• Book format: novel.
• Year of publication of the book in Russian: 2014.

The book is about how much the fate of an ordinary citizen can depend on government changes. The author describes the life of compatriots against the background of political and social transformations within the country, immersing the reader in the history and culture of China.

8. "Second-hand time", Svetlana Aleksievich

• Country of residence of the author: Belarus.
• Book format: novel.
• Year of publication of the book in Russian: 2013.

The final book of the fiction-documentary cycle about the USSR. This time Aleksievich writes about the collapse of the Soviet empire and the related experiences of ordinary people. The book consists of real monologues recorded by the author over several years of his life.

9. "Swing of breath", Hertha Müller

• Country of residence of the author: Germany.
• Book format: novel.
• Year of publication of the book in Russian: 2011.

The main character is one of the Transylvanian Germans deported to the USSR after the end of World War II. The book is based on the real biography of the poet Oscar Pastior, who spent several years in a Soviet forced labor camp for prisoners.

10. "Cain", Jose Saramago

• Country of residence of the author: Portugal.
• Book format: novel.
• Year of publication of the book in Russian: 2010.

A bold transcription of biblical stories, in which Cain is the protagonist. The author rethought the image of the murderer Abel and his role in the fates of other figures. This rebellious novel by Saramago was his dying gift to readers.