2021 Nobel Prize for Literature awarded to Tanzanian writer Abdulrazak Gurnah

STOCKHOLM — Tanzanian writer Abdulrazak Gurnah has been awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature.

The Swedish Academy said Thursday the award was in recognition of his “uncompromising and compassionate penetration of the effects of colonialism.”

Born in Zanzibar in 1948 and based in England, Gurnah is a professor at the University of Kent. He is the author of 10 novels, including “Paradise,” which was shortlisted for the Booker Prize in 1994.

Anders Olsson, chairman of the Nobel Committee for Literature, called him “one of the world’s most prominent post-colonial writers.”

The prestigious award comes with a gold medal and 10 million Swedish kronor (over $1.14 million).

The 2020 Nobel Prize for Literature went to American poet Louise Glück for what the judges described as her “unmistakable poetic voice that with austere beauty makes individual existence universal.”