Finally a poet, was one of the possible reactions to the news about the Nobel Prize for 2011. Tomas Transtremer is the so-called "pure poet", one of the last living preachers of the high modernist concept of poetry.
In the explanation of the jury of the Swedish Academy, it is said that he was awarded for "a fresh approach to reality, condensed and airy poetic images, precision of expression, as well as sharpness of metaphors".
The selection of a long-term, and also local candidate could not be called a surprise. All these years, when making betting lists, his name was listed relatively high - in the first four or five possible winners.
Certainly - Nobel's new century began with a decade unfavorable to poetry
In recent years, the secretary of the Swedish Academy, who has been very active in the media (the author of a not-so-happy statement about American literature), Peter Englund said on Thursday that Transtremer received the news almost astounded. “He was sitting and listening to music. He said it was great”.
Saying "Finally, a poet" also made sense considering the unusual practice of the Swedish Academy in the last ten years. It sounds almost unbelievable, but, if we exclude the universal Gao Singđen (2000), who, in addition to novels, also wrote poetry and painted watercolors, but was awarded primarily for his prose works, the poet has not received an award since the mid-nineties, when in 1995 and in 1996, even two poets were awarded in a row – the Irishman Šejmus Heaney and the Polish woman Vislava Šimborska.
The nineties were, it seems, more generous towards poetry - in addition to the aforementioned, Derek Walcott, that wonderful "Caribbean Homer", was also awarded. Before him, in 1990, the Mexican bard Octavio Paz was selected.
This position of poetry with the Nobel jury is all the more unusual because there is an internal recommendation, albeit non-binding, that neither a poet nor a prose writer should be awarded more than twice in a row. Obviously, the new millennium imposed new rules.
Since 2001, only prose writers followed, one after the other, with one playwright. First Naipaul, then the Hungarian Imre Kertesz (2002), the brilliant South African John Maxwell Kutzi (2003), then the controversial but also very intriguing Austrian writer Elfriede Jelinek (2004), in 2005 there was a "dramatic break" - Harold Pinter was awarded, then again in the old way – Orhan Pamuk (2006), Doris Lessing (2007), Le Klezio (2008), Herta Miller (2009) and 2010, Mario Vargas Llosa.
"In the mid-fifties, having traveled two thousand kilometers, I started from the far north, in order to realize the intended thirty-day cruise in the exotic Balkans"
Certainly - Nobel's new century began with a decade unfavorable to poetry.
This year's laureate, Tomas Transtremer, graduated in psychology and, despite a successful literary career, he pursued that calling for a long time, working on the rehabilitation and socialization of handicapped persons and young criminals.
He published eleven books of poetry - among them the most famous are "17 Poems", "Secrets on the Road", "Half-Finished Sky", "Sounds and Rails", "Barrier of Truth", "Baltic", "Wild Market", "Sad Gondola". ”, as well as a book of memoir prose.
He couldn't resist the call of haiku either, so he wrote a collection of haiku poetry, which was published bilingually, in Swedish and Danish.
Transtremer's international literary fame began in the seventies. That's when Penguin published his book in his legendary edition of poetry.
He is accompanied by a reputation as a travel poet, a reflection on nature, an emphasized need to grasp the complexity of our existence. He is the most translated contemporary Swedish poet.
Transtremer's verses, and a kind of "secular prayers", were also translated by great poets such as Česlav Miloš and Gennadi Ajgi.
Writer and journalist Moma Dimić is the first translator of Transtremer into a common language
This poet has been present on the ex-yu cultural space for decades. The fact that in 2003 he received the prestigious international Golden Wreath of the Struga Poetry Evenings has special merits for this. Belgrade Nolit published his "Collected Poems". It seems that Transtremer was also fond of these areas.
"In the mid-fifties, having traveled two thousand kilometers, I started from the far north, in order to realize the intended thirty-day cruise in the exotic Balkans," he once explained.
Writer and journalist Moma Dimić is the first translator of Transtremer into a common language. Describing that mythical journey of the young Transtremer, Dimić writes: "He was only twenty-three years old." It was summer, he came from the direction of Italy, and then: Ruma, Šabac, Banja Koviljača, Sarajevo, Kotor, Kosovska Mitrovica!
He fell ill in Peja and lay for several days in a room where there were more than fifty patients. From that journey through the Balkans, in addition to "Black Mountains", one of Transtremer's key songs, "The Formula of the Journey", was created, which we all (even then) joined, from the "mourning murmur that drags itself with the plow across the plains of Srem" ( ten years after the Srem Front), to the children playing football under the stars."
In one of his most famous lines, Transtremer gleefully concludes that "truth is everywhere forgotten at the end of the road".
"Home" after 37 years
The award to Transtremer also activated the old complaint about the "discreet patriotism" of Swedish academics. In the past one hundred and ten years, as many as eight Swedes (and numerous other Scandinavians) have been awarded the Nobel Prize, and on that literary "cup" Swedish literature is ahead of Russian, Spanish, Italian, Polish...
The wise policy of the Stockholm elders actually contributed enormously to the global dimension of Swedish literature
"Phenomenu Argentina" is a special story. Argentine literature is still waiting for its first Nobel, as if the Stockholm "anger at Borges" is still alive, "magically" transferred to other Argentine writers.
However, the impression is that the Swedish academics were actually quite careful and measured: they did not exaggerate the "locals" so much as to threaten the planetary credibility of this award, and again, it is not that they did not use the privilege of its awarding to make visible the peaks of their own literature.
The wise policy of the Stockholm elders actually contributed enormously to the global dimension of Swedish literature. The first recipient of the award was the first lady among the literary laureates, Selma Lagerlef (1909), and before Transtremer, the award remained in Sweden for the last time in 1974, when it was shared by Eyvind Jonsson and Hari Martinsson.
Direct contact with people
In an interview for Belgrade's "Književne novine" published twenty years ago, Tomas Transtremer said: "I fulfill all my political and social needs at the workplace, in direct contact with people."
But I completely understand those who write all day, or engage in some other intellectual activities, and then turn to politics. Their political being is not satisfied."
Winners from 1981 to 2011
- 1981 – Elias Canetti (Germany)
- 1982 – García Márquez (Colombia)
- 1983 – William Golding (Britain)
- 1984 – Jaroslav Seifert (Czech Republic)
- 1985 – Claude Simon (France)
- 1986 – Vole Sojinka (Nigeria)
- 1987 – Joseph Brodsky (Russia)
- 1988 – Nagib Mahfouz (Egypt)
- 1989 – Jose Camilo Sela (Spain)
- 1990 – Octavio Paz (Mexico)
- 1991 – Nadine Gordimer (South Africa)
- 1992 – Derek Walcott (Trinidad)
- 1993 – Toni Morrison (USA)
- 1994 – Oe (Japan)
- 1995 – Seamus Heaney (Ireland)
- 1996 – Vislava Šimborska (Poland)
- 1997 - Dario Fo (Italy)
- 1998 - Jose Saramago (Portugal)
- 1999 - Ginter Grass (Germany)
- 2000 - Gao Xingzhen (China)
- 2001 - VS Naipaul (Trinidad)
- 2002 – Imre Kertes (Hungary)
- 2003 – J. M. Kuci (South Africa)
- 2004 – Elfride Jelinek (Austria)
- 2005 – Harold Pinter (England)
- 2006 - Orhan Pamuk (Turkey)
- 2007 - Doris Lessing (England)
- 2008 – Le Clézio (France)
- 2009 – Herta Müller (Germany)
- 2010 – Vargas Llosa (Peru)
- 2011 – Toman Transtremer (Sweden)
Bonus video:
