Nobel Prize predicton, 2013 !

The Nobel Prize in Literature: TBA this Thursday ! Who do you think will win ?

The New York Times article [link below] mentions Haruki Murakami--who[m] I really like. (Reading Norwegian Wood right now.  Read 3 others--my favorite: Hard-Boiled Wonderland.)

_But_ ... I'm gonna predict the poet Adonis ! To represent, for Syria. (And he's great, a ton of fun.)

Sometimes they say: the prize in Lit. can be act like a 2nd peace prize.http://www.latimes.com/books/jacketcopy/la-et-jc-who-will-win-the-nobel-literature-prize-2013-20131007,0,7700231.story

 p.s. I swear: I didn't actually read the whole article, and put Adonis anyway--then I saw: he shows up at the end.  (But I've seen his name on the short list, other years--so that's why I bought a book of his.)



And...back in the day--getting an MFA in UMass--I was trying to be a little expert on the Nobel Prize, like as a shadow thesis.  (Vs. just writing a bunch of poems.)

Remember, I went on a Mormon mission to Sweden, too--got back and thought: "Should be able to do something useful with this language."  (Tried a tiny bit of translation--and liked it.)

I actually put together a little anthology of Nobel Prize-winning poetry, b/c it doesn't exist, and it should.  (People would buy it.)  Not totally finished, but: sent to FSG a while ago.  Haven't heard back.

Anyhow...




Part II !

Someone--Cassandra Jones--wondered: "Margaret Atwood?"--so I'll say a few words.  You do see a few Americans on lists every now and then: Phillip Roth, Joyce Carol Oates.  I like Thomas Pynchon, altho. he's kind of thick, hard to read.  But...

I don't think so.  Wouldn't put my money on it.  Think they a little Anti-American.  Two years ago, one of the main people... [Horace Engdahl, maybe?--the guy that actually announces them] came out and said--paraphrasing, basically: "No one in America is writing anything of international importance.  Like they're regionalists."

And they were catching flak for a while: too many English or European winners.  So, they are playing catch-up a little.  (They've admitted it.)  A Chinese winner last year...


Okay, sincerely, good enough.