Hungarian writer Laszlo Krasznahorkai wins 2025 Nobel Prize in literature

Hungarian author László Krasznahorkai, whose philosophical, bleakly comic novels often unfold in single sentences, has won the 2025 Nobel Prize in Literature for his “engaging and prescient work that reaffirms the power of art amid apocalyptic terror.”

Many works, including his debut deviltango And The Melancholy of ResistanceIt was made into a film by Hungarian director Béla Tarr.

The Nobel jury praised his “artistic gaze, which is completely free of illusion and sees the fragility of the social order, and his unwavering belief in the power of art,” Steve Sem-Sandberg of the Nobel committee said in the announcement.

“László Krasznahorkai is a great epic writer characterized by absurdity and grotesque excesses in the Central European tradition from (Franz) Kafka to Thomas Bernhard,” the Nobel jury said.

Krasznahorkai, 71, could not immediately be reached for comment. He did not speak in the statement.

He was born in the city of Gyula in southeastern Hungary, near the border with Romania. During the 1970s, he studied law at universities in Szeged and Budapest before turning to literature. According to the biography section of his website, he has traveled extensively throughout Europe, Asia and America and has lived in many different countries.

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Krasznahorkai has been a vocal critic of autocratic Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, particularly his government’s lack of support for Ukraine after the Russian invasion. He said in an interview for: Yale Review this year: “How can a country be neutral when the Russians are occupying a neighboring country?”

But in a post on Facebook, Orbán was quick to congratulate the author, saying: “The pride of Hungary, the first Nobel Prize winner László Krasznahorkai from Gyula. Congratulations!”