Tornos News — Nobel laureate Orhan Pamuk will be awarded an honorary doctorate by the Literature Department of the University of Crete on May 4, 2018, the university announced on Tuesday.
The decision was made by the university’s professors who wanted to honour “a great writer with international recognition, holder of the 2006 Nobel Prize for Literature, and as a democratic conscience who doesn’t hesitate to talk about human rights.”
Pamuk supports the Kurdish political rights movement and was among a group of authors tried for writing essays that criticized Turkey’s treatment of the Kurds and has been involved in highlighting “issues relating to freedom of speech in the country of his birth”.
The event will take place at the “Pandelis Prevelakis” Hall of the Conservatory of Rethymno.
One of Turkey’s most renowned novelists, his work has sold over thirteen million books in sixty-three languages, making him the country’s best-selling writer. He is the author of the novels The White Castle, The Black Book, The New Life, My Name Is Red, Snow, The Museum of Innocence, Silent House, A Strangeness in My Mind and the Red-Haired Woman, as well as numerous non-fiction works.
Orhan Pamuk is is Professor of Comparative Literature and Writing at Columbia University.
