POLITICS LOOMS IN PAMUK’S NOBEL SPEECH
Agence France Presse — English
October 15, 2006 Sunday
Orhan Pamuk, the Turkish author who has won this year’s Nobel prize
for literature, plans to use his acceptance speech to explain his
views on several subjects, German magazine Der Spiegel said on Sunday.
Pamuk told the news weekly he was preparing "a thought piece in the
good European tradition" for delivery when he accepts the award from
Sweden’s King Carl XVI Gustaf in Stockholm on December 10.
"For the moment I am thinking of making it in the form of an essay,"
he said.
"I plan to use the opportunity to put across my point of view on
several issues," he added, but declined to reveal the content of
the speech.
Pamuk, 54, on Thursday became the first Turkish writer to win the
prestigious prize.
The politically outspoken author, whose books focus on Turkey’s
struggle between Islam and secularism and its ties to Europe, has
clashed frequently with the Turkish establishment.
Pamuk was put on trial after telling a Swiss newspaper last year that
30,000 Kurds and one million Armenians had been killed during World
War I under the Ottoman Turks.
But the case was dropped after it drew widespread international
protest.