will the prize awarded on Thursday reward a non-Western work?

A few days before the winner is revealed, literary critics reveal their favorites, estimating that non-Western writers have a serious chance of winning this year, notably the Chinese author Can Xue.

Dominated by Western literature since its creation, the prestigious Nobel Prize for Literature, which will be awarded on Thursday October 10, could reward a writer who writes neither in French nor in English, according to experts. Chinese author Can Xue frequently appears in literary critics’ favorites lists.

Avant-garde and compared to Kafka for the unreal and dark atmosphere that permeates his novels and short stories, his experimental style oscillates between utopia and dystopia and transforms the mundane into the surreal. This year, “the choice of the winner will take the cultural elite on the wrong foot“, predicts Björn Wiman, head of the cultural department of the Swedish daily Dagens Nyheter.

A bit like in 2021 when the committee opted for the British novelist Abdulrazak Gurnah, born in Zanzibar, Tanzania, who explores the torments of exile and anti-colonialism. The committee regularly likes to surprise, underlines Björn Wiman who imagines that a Mexican or Argentine novelist or a writer from the African continent could logically win. “I believe it will be a woman from a non-European language region“, he bets.

The journalist’s heart, however, beats for Salman Rushdie, more than ever a strong symbol of freedom of expression after being stabbed in 2022, an attack that he recounted in The Knife, published in April 2024. “But we will blame [à l’Académie] for having chosen a man again in the second half of life“, notes Björn Wiman. Last year, the prize was awarded to the Norwegian playwright Jon Fosse. Since its creation, out of a total of 120 laureates, only 17 women have won the Nobel Prize for literature. And for 16 French-speaking laureates, only one Arabic-speaking author was distinguished: the Egyptian Naguib Mahfouz, in 1988.

To take the example of China, its “literature is very vast“but this is not reflected in the history of the Nobel award, notes Carin Franzén, professor of literature at Stockholm University.

The last time a Chinese writer received the prize was in 2012, when Mo Yan was crowned. An explanation for this under-representation could be the Academy members’ lack of knowledge of foreign literature, ventures Victor Malm, head of the cultural department of the Swedish daily. Expressenwho thinks American-Antiguan author Jamaica Kincaid will win this year.

“I find it hard to believe that the name of a Hindi writer will suddenly appear. No one at the Academy speaks Hindi. How could they credibly express themselves on the subject?“, he said, insisting on the fact that for such languages ​​they depend on the existence of translated versions. The Academy has, however, always consulted literature experts and, since 2021, this approach has become systematized in the languages ​​not mastered by the members.This is of course not the same as being able to read in the original language“, says Lina Kalmteg, literary journalist at Swedish Public Radio (SR).

It is very rare that the writers in the running “are not translated into Swedish at all“So why such a lack, for a prize considered a world benchmark for literature? Because, historically, Western culture was considered superior, notes Rasmus Landström, literary critic for the Swedish daily Aftonbladet. “It was said very clearly” at the time, “but I don’t think that’s the case anymore“.

Upon the publication of the jury’s deliberations – kept secret for fifty years, “we realized that this is a topic that has been widely debated“through the ages, he argues. Since the #MeToo scandal in 2018 which tarnished its reputation, the circle wants to expand this reward geographically and linguistically.”It would therefore be interesting to open up to a non-European perspective“and the Nobel has the capacity to democratize more confidential authors,” argues Carin Franzén, whose favorite is the Canadian poet Anne Carson.

The editor-in-chief of culture Göteborgs-Posten Johan Hilton, for his part, is betting on a writer from central or eastern Europe. “France, the United States and the United Kingdom have been winners on numerous occasions in recent years“, he notes. But there is no question of rewarding a Russian, even a personality critical of the regime, according to him. “It’s politically impossible. If a Russian author wins this year, [le prix] will lose all its relevance and credibility”. A reasoning that Victor Malm does not share, who argues that a critic of the regime cannot be used as a propaganda instrument by the Kremlin.

Like every year, the names of other “regular” nobel candidates are circulating, such as those of the Hungarian Laszlo Krasznahorkai, the Romanian Mircea Cartarescu, the Kenyan Ngugi wa Thiong’o, the Australian Gerald Murnane and the Japanese Haruki Murakami.

The suspense will be lifted at 11:00 GMT when the Swedish Academy will reveal the identity of the lucky winner, who will obtain a check for 11 million Swedish crowns (more than 970,000 euros).