Nobel Prize in Literature goes to French author Annie Ernaux

Photo: Collected

The highly anticipated Nobel Prize in literature has been awarded to the French author Annie Ernaux "for the courage and clinical acuity with which she uncovers the roots, estrangements and collective restraints of personal memory."

Last year's bookmaker's favourite, Annie Ernaux, was at the top of the list, consistently and from different angles, examines a life marked by strong disparities regarding gender, language and class. Her path to authorship was long and arduous.

Born on 1 September 1940, the Nobel laureate is a French writer and professor of literature; her literary works are mostly autobiographical, maintaning close links with sociology.

This year's prize goes to "the person who shall have produced in the field of literature the most outstanding work in an ideal direction". The award is decided on by the Swedish Academy, a group of 18 people who consist of Swedish writers, linguists, literary scholars, historians and a prominent jurist, reads the official website of Nobel Prize. 

The prize is the most prestigious literature award in the world, with the winner receiving 10m SEK (£1m), reports The Guardian.

Salman Rushdie, who was stabbed earlier this year shortly before giving a lecture, was among the favourites to win this year's Nobel Prize for literature, according to bookmakers.

Rushdie, whose work includes the bestselling and controversial novel The Satanic Verses, was stabbed in the neck and torso as he was about to deliver a lecture at the Chautauqua Institution in New York state on 12 August.

The Nobel Prize Twitter today posted a photograph of 1913 winner Rabindranath Tagore with a tribute, ahead of the announcement of the 2022 prize for literature, reports NDTV.

He was the first Indian and non-European to win the Nobel Prize in Literature.

The tweet quoted one of his verses — "The butterfly counts not months but moments, and has time enough" — and described his poetry as "sensitive, fresh and beautiful".

The Nobel Prize's twitter page paid a tribute to "one of the most powerful and distinguished storytellers of our time: Toni Morrison, became the first African American woman to be awarded a #NobelPrize when she received the literature prize in 1993."

Ernest Hemingway was awarded the 1954 literature prize. One of his most famous quotes says, "All good books are alike in that they are truer than if they had really happened and after you are finished reading one you will feel that all that happened to you and afterwards it all belongs to you."