Chinese Novelist Wins Literature Nobel

S T O C K H O L M, Sweden, Oct. 12 -- Dissident Chinese writer Gao Xingjian,who fled his native country after a play was banned, won the NobelPrize in literature today for writings about the struggle of theindividual that have opened new paths for Chinese literature.

The Swedish Academy cited Gao, 60, for his “bitter insights andlinguistic ingenuity.”

Gao, who left his home in eastern China in 1987 and settledin Paris the following year as a political refugee, was the firstChinese writer to receive the prestigious literature prize.

‘Literature Is Born Anew’

“In the writing of Gao Xingjian literature is born anew fromthe struggle of the individual to survive the history of themasses,” the academy said in its citation. “He is a perspicaciousskeptic who makes no claim to be able to explain the world. Heasserts that he has found freedom only in writing.”

None of his plays have been performed in China since 1986, whenhis work The Other Shore was banned. He left China in 1987 andsettled in Paris the following year as a political refugee.

The prize this year is worth 9 million kronor (US$915,000).

Guenter Grass won last year’s prize as one of the most prominentauthors to emerge from a group of young intellectuals who set outto revive German literature after the Nazi era.

The literature award — usually the first — was the fifth andlast Nobel prize unveiled in Stockholm this week. The Nobel PeacePrize winner will be named Friday in Oslo, Norway.

Week of Nobel Winners

Two Americans won the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics onWednesday for developing theories on how people work and live,contributing greatly to employment training programs andtransportation and communication systems.

James J. Heckman, 56, of the University of Chicago, and DanielL. McFadden, 63, of the University of California at Berkeley, werecited for methods of analyzing statistics that have hadwide-ranging practical applications, according to the Royal SwedishAcademy of Sciences.