Imre Kertesz life and biography

Imre Kertész is a Hungarian Jewish author, Holocaust concentration camp survivor, and winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2002 "for writing that upholds the fragile experience of the individual against the barbaric arbitrariness of history".

Kertész' best-known work, Fatelessness (Sorstalanság), describes the experience of fifteen-year-old György (George) Köves in the concentration camps of Auschwitz, Buchenwald and Zeitz. Some have interpreted the book as quasi-autobiographical, but the author disavows a strong biographical connection. His writings translated into English include Kaddish for a Child Not Born (Kaddis a meg nem született gyermekért) and Liquidation (Felszámolás). Kertész initially found little appreciation for his writing in Hungary and moved to Germany. Kertész started translating German works into Hungarian-such as The Birth of Tragedy by Nietzsche, the plays of Dürrenmatt, Schnitzler and Tankred Dorst, the thoughts of Wittgenstein-and did not publish another novel until the late 1980s. He continues to write in Hungarian and submits his works to publishers in Hungary.

Deported to Auschwitz by the Nazis. Recipient, 2002 Nobel Prize for literature. Decried Schindler's List as "kitsch."

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