19 October 2005

FRANKFURT: A day after The Daily Star reported on the Turkish writer Orhan Pamuk's upcoming trial for belittling Turkish identity, the author was awarded Germany's highest literary honor at the 57th Frankfurt book fair. Reflecting the strongly political bent of this year's fair, the nation of honor, Korea, is represented by 62 mainly South Korean authors, many of whom have suffered in the struggle for reunification of the divided peninsula while Pamuk risks a jail sentence in his homeland.

The latter told the German press this week that winning the prestigious German publishers' peace prize made him smile, given the storm he

has unleashed with his remarks about the mass killings

of Armenians under the Ottoman Empire.

"There is a certain irony, given the political light in which this prize is viewed both in Turkey and in Germany. It is almost as though I should not be proud of the literary quality of my work," he told the weekly magazine Der Spiegel.

"It is a good thing I recently wrote a deliberately political novel," Pamuk added, referring to his seventh novel "Snow," a bestseller that looks at the clash between the collective culture and the longing for personal identity in the Muslim world.

Pamuk, who says "writing is my religion," has found that as his fame has grown he has become a figurehead for Turkey and its problems.

He outraged the Turkish authorities by telling a Swiss newspaper that "one million Armenians and Turks were killed in these lands and nobody but me dares talk about it." He is due to appear in court in December on charges of denigrating Turkish national identity but has refused to retract his remarks.

The past recipients of the peace prize include the late feminist icon Susan Sontag who won it in 2003, at a time when she was considered a traitor in the United States for her hard-hitting criticism of the invasion of Iraq.

The book fair almost coincides with the worldwide release last Friday of the latest title in the Asterix comic series, "Asterix and the Falling Sky," a none-too-subtle lampoon of the United States.

With an initial run of eight million - 2.5 million of them on sale in Germany alone - Albert Uderzo's latest effort may well have broken the record for a first print run of any comic book ever published.

But in Germany, as in most other countries, reviews of the thinly veiled satire of U.S. President George W. Bush and his administration have been lukewarm at best.

"Asterix and the Falling Sky," the 33rd adventure of the diminutive Gallic warrior sees Uderzo, 78, introduce creatures from outer space, led by a cuddly toy who has, at his beck and call, an army of dim Superman clones in tights and capes. They announce they are from a planet called Tadsylwine - an anagram of Walt Disney - and that their "sage" goes by the name of Hubs - an anagram of Bush.

Uderzo - who has created the comic books single-handedly since the death of author Rene Goscinny in 1977 - said he was dabbling for the first time in international politics.

"Let us say that I had fun caricaturing certain things which have come from America."

Uderzo is among a host of well-known authors who will attend the fair, which opens on Wednesday and ends on Sunday. - AFP with The Daily Star