Nobel Prize for Literature goes to Le Clezio of France

While The Normal School congratulates M. Le Clezio, it is interesting to note that much of the discussion this week about why NOT an American hinged on the fact that only a relatively small amount of American writers' work finds its way into translation.

Yet, Publisher's Lunch reports that "Very few of [Le Clezio's] works are currently available in US editions, though the NYT says that 12 of his 40 works have been translated at some point. Among them, the University of Nebraska Press published The Round and Other Cold Hard Facts in 2003, and Onitsha in 1997; Curbstone Press published Wandering Star in 2004. But Agence France Presse assures that he 'is one of the French writers best known outside his country and one of the most wide-ranging in his choice of subject matter. He is an avid traveller, and his fictions are as likely to be set in Mexico or the Sahara as in Paris or London.' He lives part of the year in New Mexico and is reported to have taught at the University of New Mexico."

www.nytimes.com