The Nobel Prize Winner in Literature 2003

“To imagine the unimaginable” is the writer’s duty. As a post-modern allegorist, Coetzee knows that novels that do not seek to mimic reality best convince us that reality exists. Coetzee sees through the obscene poses and false pomp of history, lending voice to the silenced and the despised. Restrained but stubborn, he defends the ethical value of poetry, literature and imagination. Without them, we blinker ourselves and become bureaucrats of the soul” (Per Wästberg – Presentation Speech for Nobel Prize in Literature)

The 2003 Nobel Prize Award Ceremony

Watch the 2003 Nobel Laureates Video – Ceremonies at the Stockholm Concert Hall in Sweden, 10 December 2003. Credits: Sveriges Television AB (production) Credits: Lorenette Gozzo (voice over)
Copyright © Sveriges Television AB 2003