2003 Nobel Prize in Literature

The 2003 Nobel Prize in Literature has been awarded to J. M. Coetzee. The prize was announced by the Swedish Academy in Stockholm on 2 October 2003.

The citation

The citation reads: "who in innumerable guises portrays the surprising involvement of the outsider".

The laureate

J. M. Coetzee was born in 1940 in Cape Town, South Africa.

Why it matters

The South African novelist is best known for Disgrace and Life and Times of Michael K, both of which won the Booker Prize, making him the first author to win it twice.

The prize

The prize is worth 10 million Swedish kronor. It will be presented at a ceremony in Stockholm on 10 December, the anniversary of the death of Alfred Nobel, the Swedish inventor of dynamite whose will founded the prizes in 1895.