And They're Off: Murakami Third Favorite for Nobel Prize - Wall Street Journal (blog)

By Yoree Koh

With the official start of the Nobel season, the now annual speculation among fans of Haruki Murakami is picking up steam: Could this be the year the Swedish Academy finally gives him the nod?

Just two days prior to the announcement, U.K.-based bookmaker Ladbrokes has the 62-year-old writer as the third-most likely winner with odds of 8/1. That more or less rates him as likely to win as last year, when he was priced a 7/1 third favorite.

According to some news reports, whispers within Stockholm's literary circles suggest that the volatile events in the Middle East could be a factor in this year's outcome. Hence Syrian poet Adonis — real name Ali Ahmed Said Esber — is the current favorite, a 4/1 shot with Ladbrokes. France-based Adonis, 81, is rated slightly ahead of octogenarian Swedish poet Tomas Transtromer.

But Adonis and Mr. Murakami share several traits with past laureates. Winners have typically been awarded many other distinctions leading up to the coveted Swedish medal, while also seeming to break away from the status quo. In August, Adonis became the first Arab writer to win the esteemed Goethe prize in Germany. His poetic style is rated a sharp turn from the traditional structures of Arabic poetry, and he has been critical of the handling of the Middle East situation.

Mr. Murakami, meanwhile, didn't parse his words about his native country's reliance on nuclear power when he accepted the International Catalunya Prize in June. In his speech, he intimated that the accident at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant was a self-inflicted blow – "a mistake committed by our very own hands."

His latest criticism echoes the reoccurring themes seen in novels in which his protagonists are defiant symbols against the orderly, group mentality pervasive in Japanese culture. Though already well known to foreign readers, Mr. Murakami may also be on the cusp of a much bigger audience still, with the long-awaited English-version of his epic "1Q84" set to be released on Oct. 25. The voluminous trilogy sold four million copies in Japan since it came out in 2009.

If Mr. Murakami does win, it'll be quite a coup: Only two Japanese authors have won the literature honor in the past – Kenzaburo Oe, also prominent since March 11 in the anti-nuclear movement, in 1994, and Yasunari Kawabata in 1968.

Of course, with the judges offering next to nothing by way of indicating who's in the running each year, plenty of prominent authors find their names associated with the prize in regular fashion. This year Ladbrokes is offering odds of 12/1 on Algeria's French-language novelist Assai Djebar; South Korea's Ko Un is at 14/1, while prices are also on offer for a spate of American authors: Thomas Pynchon (18/1), Philip Roth (20/1), Cormac McCarthy (25/1) and  Joyce Carol Oates (25/1).

And the bookies' record in predicting the winner? Spotty. Peru's 2010 winner, Mario Vargas Llosa, was more of an outsider than Mr. Murakami, offered at 9/1 shortly before the announcement.

The Nobel Prize for Literature will be announced on Oct. 6 at 11.00 a.m. GMT. The prize money is 10 million Swedish kronor, or $1.44 million.