STOCKHOLM, Oct 6 — This year’s Nobel literature prize could go to a Chinese or a Caribbean woman when it is awarded later this week, literary critics say, in a bid to diversify an award that has most often gone to Western male authors.
There is no public shortlist for the Nobel, and with the deliberations of the Swedish Academy that awards the prize and the list of nominees remaining sealed for 50 years, Stockholm’s literary circles engage in frantic guessing ahead of the announcement.
The suspense will end on Thursday at 1.00pm (1100 GMT, 7pm Malaysian time) when the 18-member Swedish Academy reveals its pick.
Antiguan-American author Jamaica Kincaid, 77, whose work explores Caribbean culture, family and identity as well as colonialism and race, has often been mentioned in Nobel speculation, as has China’s Can Xue, whose avant-garde experimental writing has been compared to that of Kafka.
