The 2009 Nobel Prize in literature was awarded today to Romanian-born German writer Herta Mueller (Müller). Born August 17, 1953, Mueller is a highly prolific novelist and essayist whose works portray the human destruction of the Romanian dictatorship and the rootlessness of the political exile. Her novels include “The Land of Green Plums” and “The Appointment.”
Herta Mueller is a Romanian-born German novelist, poet and essayist noted for her works depicting the harsh conditions of life in Romania under Ceauşescu. She studied German language and culture studies in Timisoara, and then took up a job as a translator in a car factory. Muller’s refusal to collaborate with the secret police led her to lose her job, and she earned a living by giving private German lessons, before emigrating to West Germany in 1987. Since her literary debut in 1982, Herta Muller has published more than 20 books which have been translated into many languages.
The Romanian national press was very critical of Herta Mueller's works while the German press received them in a positive manner. Because she had publicly criticized the dictatorship in Romania, she was prohibited from publishing in her own country. In 1987, Mueller emigrated together with her husband, author Richard Wagner.
Today's announcement of Herta Mueller as the 2009 winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature described her as "who, with the concentration of poetry and the frankness of prose, depicts the landscape of the dispossessed". Living in a dictatorship, Mueller has been noted as having "extreme precision" in her words which comes from living in a dictatorship that corrupts language. Her words are seen as picturesque episodes that make a big picture for her readers.
Herta Mueller's latest novel is based on experience of her mother living in a labor camp and is one of the many compelling reasons for Mueller winning the Nobel Prize in Literature. Mueller's mother spent five years in a work camp in present-day Ukraine. Many years later, in her novel Atemschaukel (2009), Müller depicted the exile of the German Romanians in the Soviet Union
The awards ceremony for Herta Mueller to receive her Nobel Prize in Literature 2009 is planned for December in Stockholm. As the winner, Ms. Mueller will receive 10 million Swedish kronor, about $1.4 million.
Cheryl Phillips
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