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Who is S Korea's Han Kang: First Asian woman to win Nobel in Literature

The academy praised Kang for having a "unique awareness of the connections between body and soul, the living and the dead" Kang was born in 1970 in South Korea's Gwangju

Han Kang, South Korea, Nobel

Han Kang won the Man Booker International Prize in 2016. (Photo: HanKang.net)

Nisha Anand New Delhi

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The Nobel Prize in Literature 2024 was awarded to South Korean author Han Kang for her work that "exposes the fragility of human life," the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences announced on Thursday. Kang is the first Asian woman to win the award.

Who is Han Kang: first Asian woman to win Nobel in Literature

The academy praised Kang for having a “unique awareness of the connections between body and soul, the living and the dead” Kang was born in 1970 in South Korea’s Gwangju and currently lives in Seoul, the capital of South Korea.

She comes from a literary background, with her father being a novelist. One of her most celebrated works is her novel The Vegetarian, for which she won the Man Booker International Prize in 2016. The novel was originally published in Korean in 2007. Her prose debut was in 1995 with a short story collection. Additionally, she has also devoted time to art and music.
 

Other Nobel Prize winners of 2024

On Wednesday, the academy announced this year’s Chemistry prizes, split between two sets of three winners: David Baker for his contributions to computational protein design, and Demis Hassabis and John M. Jumper for their work in protein structure prediction.

Hassabis is the chief executive officer of Google DeepMind, while Jumper is a senior scientist there. Baker is a professor at the University of Washington.

The academy has also announced winners for the field of medicine, awarded to Victor Ambros and Gary Ruvkun. The Physics prize has been awarded to John J. Hopfield and Geoffrey E. Hinton.

Nobel Peace Prize 2024 announcement today

The Nobel Peace Prize 2024 winner will be announced on Friday by the academy.

The Nobel Prizes, named after Swedish industrialist and inventor Alfred Nobel, have been awarded since 1901. The prizes recognise remarkable achievements in Physics, Chemistry, Physiology or Medicine, Literature, and Peace.

Born in 1833, Alfred Nobel bequeathed most of his fortune to establish the Nobel Prizes.


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First Published: Oct 11 2024 | 9:37 AM IST

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