John Maxwell Coetzee, whose novels and essays are characterized by ableak（荒涼的, 凄涼的）vision of his racially divided homeland, is the second South African author to win the Nobel Prize. Nadine Gordimer received the award in 1991.

Mr. Coetzee was the first writer to win Britain's prestigiousBooker Prize（布克獎(jiǎng)）twice, first forThe Life and Times of Michael K（《麥可·K 的生命與時(shí)代》）in 1983 and, again, forDisgrace（《恥》） in 1999.

But the publicity-shy author has long been skittish about the attention of the media and stayed away from the awards ceremony on both occasions.

Mr. Coetzee's main characters are often innocents oroutcasts（被遺棄的）who are overwhelmed by historical forces over which they have no influence. South Africa's formerapartheid（種族隔離）system of separating the races is a recurring theme in his works.

The Swedish Academy praised Mr. Coetzee for his intellectual honesty, noting that the 63-year-old author has been, in its words, ruthless in his criticism of the cruel rationalism and cosmetic morality in western civilization.

The academy, in announcing the .3 million award, also noted that, although Mr. Coetzee makes the distinction between right and wrongcrystal clear（極其明白, 十分清楚）, he also portrays it as being ultimately pointless.

Mr. Coetzee was born inCape Town（開(kāi)普敦）to an English-speaking family of Afrikaaner background. Though he has spent most of his life in South Africa, he studied and worked in the United States and Britain and emigrated to Australia two years ago.

His novels includeWaiting for the Barbarians（《等待野蠻人》）andDusklands（《幽暗之鄉(xiāng)》）as well as his latest work of fiction,Elizabeth Costello（《伊麗莎白．克絲泰洛》）. He has also written essays on such topics as rugby and censorship.

The literature prize is the first of the Nobels to be awarded this year. In the days ahead, the Swedish Academy will announce the winners of the medicine, physics, chemistry and economics prizes. On October 10, the Norwegian Academy will announce the winner of the Nobel Peace Prize.

note:

Booker Prize：布克獎(jiǎng)，Booker是英國(guó)最大的現(xiàn)購(gòu)批發(fā)商，英國(guó)出版名人馬斯開(kāi)爾TomMaschler找到這個(gè)企業(yè)贊助，成立了一項(xiàng)鼓勵(lì)文學(xué)創(chuàng)作的獎(jiǎng)項(xiàng)，獎(jiǎng)勵(lì)當(dāng)年度最佳英文小說(shuō)創(chuàng)作。