Sensational: Hungarian author László Krasznahorkai wins 2025 Nobel Prize in literature!
The Swedish Academy has awarded the 2025 Nobel Prize in Literature to Hungarian author László Krasznahorkai, recognising his “visionary body of work that reveals the power of art even amid apocalyptic terror.”
The first Hungarian winner after Imre Kertész in literature
The 71-year-old novelist, known for his dense, rhythmic prose and haunting explorations of human despair and transcendence, is the second Hungarian writer to receive the world’s most prestigious literary honour, the Nobel Prize — the first being Imre Kertész in 2002.
Born in Gyula in 1954, Krasznahorkai studied law and literature at Eötvös Loránd University before devoting himself fully to writing. His literary debut came in 1977 in the influential journal Mozgó Világ, and he rose to international prominence with his 1985 novel Satantango — later adapted into a celebrated seven-hour film by director Béla Tarr, his long-time collaborator and friend. The pair went on to create Werckmeister Harmonies (2000) and The Turin Horse (2011), both acclaimed worldwide.
The second Hungarian Nobel Prize winner in literature
The Swedish Academy, which awards the Nobel Prize, praised Krasznahorkai as a master of the Central European tradition of the absurd and grotesque, drawing comparisons to Kafka and Thomas Bernhard, writes 444. His style — characterised by long, flowing sentences and philosophical depth — confronts the meaninglessness of existence in desolate settings that nevertheless reveal universal truths. American writer Susan Sontag once called him “the contemporary Hungarian master of the apocalypse.”
Krasznahorkai’s major works include The Melancholy of Resistance (1989), War and War (1999), Seiobo There Below (2008), Baron Wenckheim’s Homecoming (2016), and Herscht 07769 (2021). His latest novel, Zsömle odavan, was released earlier this year, while The Security of the Hungarian Nation is due for publication in November 2025.
Throughout his career, Krasznahorkai has lived and worked across the globe — from Germany and France to Japan and the United States. His travels through East Asia, particularly China and Mongolia, deeply influenced several of his works, including The Prisoner of Urga and Destruction and Sorrow Beneath the Heavens.
Krasznahorkai already awarded many accolades
The Hungarian author has already been celebrated with numerous international accolades, including the Man Booker International Prize (2015), the National Book Award for Translated Literature (2019), and the Austrian State Prize (2021).
In an earlier interview, Krasznahorkai reflected on the meaning of literary prizes:
Awards can protect you or give you another chance to create something worthy of readers’ attention. They are like asteroids — beautiful to see, but they never quite touch the Earth.
With this year’s Nobel Prize announcement, Hungary celebrates a literary triumph long in the making — twenty-three years after Kertész’s historic win, Krasznahorkai’s dark, visionary prose has once again placed Hungarian literature on the world stage.