The 2002 Nobel Prize in Literature was announced at 19:00 GMT on October 10 at the Swedish Academy of Letters. Hungarian author Imre Kertesz (1929-) was the surprise winner, with Nigerian author Ben Okri (1959-), who had been the most highly touted, failing to make the cut. Although Kertesz was mentioned in various predictions prior to the announcement of the prize, he was never a favorite to win. His name is even more unfamiliar to Chinese readers, and even several experts on Hungarian and East European literature seem to be unaware of Kertész's life and work. So far, the author's works have not been translated into Chinese. The reason given by the Swedish Academy of Letters for the award was that Kertész's work supports and affirms the ability of the individual to confront the "hegemony of history" with his or her fragile experience.
Kertész, a Jew born Nov. 9, 1929, in Budapest, was thrown into Auschwitz by the Nazis at age 15 and later transferred to Buchwald. Among the many Jews who suffered, Kertész was considered fortunate because 1944 was only one year before the final overthrow of Nazi Germany. During his captivity, Kertész was subjected to the worst horrors of the world, as his friends and relatives died one after the other from persecution and abuse. In order to survive, Kertész learned to be patient, and it was probably because of his obedience that he was able to stay alive until the day he regained his freedom. He was rescued in 1945, an experience that undoubtedly provided him with a wealth of material to write about. The work for which he won the prize is his full-length debut novel, The Elusive Fate (Sorst alanság, 1975, also known as The Invisible Fate), which is based on his time in the concentration camps. It tells the story of Keith, a teenager who is innocently arrested and sent to a concentration camp, and who struggles through his ordeal to survive. The novel adopts a unique perspective in interpreting the various details of Keith's life in the camp. There are many similarities to the award-winning Italian movie Life is Beautiful. Keith treats life in the camps as a normal life, and despite the brutal conditions, there is never a shortage of happy moments, and Keith looks at everything from the eyes of an unsophisticated child. The author's highly rendered descriptions allow the reader to empathize, as the reader is confronted not only with the savagery and cruelty of the Nazis, but also with their baffling ignorance and helplessness. By describing his own personal experiences in his work, Kertész tirelessly explores the theme of how one lives and thinks in a time when the group to which one belongs is forced to succumb to social might. With his pen, Kertész tells people, "Survival is submission!" What it conveys is undoubtedly a philosophy of survival in which the humble individual desires to "go on living," or rather, it reaffirms the legitimacy of the natural law of survival of the fittest.
It is understandable that "An Elusive Fate" went virtually unread after its publication in 1975. There were so many books about the Nazis, Hitler and World War II in those days that readers simply didn't have time for a book written by a little-known author. It wasn't until his two sequels, Non-Hijacked (1988) and Fiasco (1990), and Prayer for an Unborn Child (1990) were published that he became known to the world and began to take his place on the world literary scene. Another of Kertész's works, "The Seeker," has been adapted into a movie.
Keltaiz's award of this year's Nobel Prize for Literature has made him a hot commodity in the world of literature. Originally unknown and never introduced in China, Kertész has also instantly become an object of attention in foreign literary and publishing circles. However, due to the lack of knowledge about him and the obstacle that Hungarian is a small language, it is obviously difficult to translate his works. It is reported that Shanghai Translation Publishing House and Yilin Publishing House, which are specialized in publishing foreign literature, have already begun to take action and try to contact the copyright. As the Frankfurt Book Fair, a worldwide book event, is being held, it is conceivable that Kertész's works will be a big hit in the book fair's copyright transactions. At present, the two major foreign literature journals in Beijing and Shanghai, World Literature and Foreign Literature and Art, are prepared to introduce Kertész in as much detail as possible. Foreign Literature and Arts plans to release a special collection in the first issue next year, but Mr. Wu Hong, the journal's editor-in-chief, said that there are difficulties in finding Kertész's works at present, and even if they can be found, Hungarian-language translators are hard to find. So the extent to which the publication will be able to do so can only be decided on the basis of the material searched for, and it is likely that it will have to be retranslated from Russian, German and other languages. Mr. Yu Zhongxian, editor-in-chief of World Literature, who has encountered basically the same difficulties, also said that in the future Chinese translations of Kertész's works, there is a greater possibility of translation, and of course it would be best if they could be translated from Hungarian.
At present, there are very few people who study the translation of Hungarian literature in China, and all of them are old people, which is a matter of great regret. The translation community is also unaware of Kertész, and it is a recognized fact that there is a lack of successors in this field. Kertész's sudden award should have been a blessing for Hungarian literature researchers and translators, but the current situation is more or less a kind of unprepared embarrassment. Think back to the 1996 Nobel Prize in Literature, another cold - Polish poetess Sim Borska after the award, more or less let a person feel a little bit of laughter.