STENTORIAN VOICES
Talk of the Town
Prizes 2025 —
An Astonishing Event
In the History of
Nobel and Booker Prizes
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Najam-uddin Ahmad
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The Nobel prizes were created in 1901 through the will of Alfred Nobel, which was drafted on 27 November 1895. And the first awards were distributed on December 10, 1901 — the fifth anniversary of Nobel’s death. French poet and essayist Sully Prudhomme was the first recipient of the Literature Prize.
Whereas, the Booker Prize started in 1969. The first prize was awarded to P.H. Newby for his novel Something to Answer For.
So, the Nobel prizes has a history of 125 years long, and the Booker prizes 57 years. But, such an astounding occurring never happened in these long years. Although there were Booker winners and Nobel laureates from the same nation or country; and/or same language but there was always years’ gap between their winning these prizes. For example, India has winners of both awards. Rabindranath Tagore won Nobel Prize in Literature 1913; Geetanjali Shree won International Booker Prize 2022 for her novel Tomb of Sand; and now, Banu Mushtaq in 2025 for her novel Heart Lamp. But, it for the first time in both the prizes’ history that in a span of just over a month, both the significant awards, gone to Hungarian authors — László Krasznahorkai and David Szalay, who’re connected by a nation, yet separated by their aesthetic universe.
So, yes. It is for the first time in history that authors from the same country have won both the Nobel Prize in Literature (2025) and the Booker Prize (2025) in the same year. Accordingly, it is an astounding event in the history of both the prizes. And thus, it has taken its place as an outstanding episode in literature prizes’ history forever.
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Born on June 02, 1971, is an Urdu novelist and short story writer. He did his masters in English Literature from Islamia University, Bahawalpur in 1996.
Work:
So far, Najam-uddin Ahmad has published three novel: Mudfun (The Burials) in 2006, Khoj (The Explore) in 2016, and Saheem (The Partners) in 2019. Apart from this, he has published two collections of short stories: Aao Bhai Khelein (Brother, Let’s play) in 2013 and Fraar aur Doosray Afsanay (Flee and other short stories) in 2017. Furthermore, he has been working on his Urdu novel, Mena Jeet. And, a collection of Urdu Short Stories is also expected soon.
Translations:
Morever, Najam-uddin Ahmad is also renowned for his translations from English to Urdu. And, he has seven books of translations on his credit. As well, among other translations he has recently translated the famous Turk epic “The Book of Dede Korkut” into Urdu, published by the Pakistan Academy of Letters. Simultaneously, he has also translated a good number of Urdu short stories into English.
Awards:
- Writers’ Guild Award, 2013 for Aao Bhai Khelein (Brother, Let’s play)
- And, UBL Excellence Award, 2017 for translation work: Nobel Inamyafta Adeebon Ki Kahanian (Short stories by Nobel Laureates in Literature).
- Also, Qoumi Adabi Award (Hassan Askari Award), 2019 from Pakistan Academy of Letters for Fasana-e-Alam — a collection of short stories by Nobel Laureates in Literature.
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