László Krasznahorkai, Nobel Prize in Literature 2025: "My greatest inspiration is bitterness"

Who would have thought that receiving a Nobel Prize could feel like a catastrophe? For László Krasznahorkai (Hungary, 1954), newly named the 2025 Nobel Prize laureate in Literature on October 9, it's "much more than a catastrophe."

After receiving the call from the Nobel Foundation, Krasznahorkai expressed surprise, humility, and some existential reflection. The Hungarian took the call from Frankfurt am Main, where he was visiting a friend. "I can't believe I'm a Nobel Prize winner, but I feel happy," he confessed in a conversation released Thursday afternoon by the Nobel Academy.

As is to be expected from an author who often writes about moral decay and the chaos of the human mind, he evoked Samuel Beckett, hence the catastrophe, as existentialist as it is personal: " I think now of Samuel Beckett's reaction after receiving his Nobel Prize... his first sentence was: 'What a catastrophe!' That's why I say that this is more than a catastrophe: it is happiness and pride."

Receiving the Nobel Prize in Literature reaffirms his determination to continue writing in his native language: "Being in a line that includes so many great writers and poets empowers me to use my original language, Hungarian." He also launched a message in defense of imagination and reading in difficult times, because without imagination, he affirmed, "life is completely different." "I wish we all regain the ability to use our imagination," he declared.

But not everything revolves around fantasy. Bitterness is also life (and creation). László Krasznahorkai has acknowledged that his main source of inspiration comes from sadness in the face of contemporary reality: "My deepest inspiration is bitterness . It saddens me deeply to think about the state of the world today. We live in very dark times and we need much more strength to survive than before."

Regarding his creative process, he has remained reserved: " I never talk about what I write," he has confessed. "I never show it, not even to my writer friends." For him, each book he writes is an attempt to improve himself.

Far from any ostentatious celebration, he revealed that his day would continue as planned , because if there was one thing that wasn't in his plans, it wasn't receiving a Nobel Prize: "Maybe in the evening I'll have dinner with my friends here in Frankfurt, with port wine and champagne."