3 h. ago Theft by Abdulrazak Gurnah review – love and betrayal from the Nobel laureate

This is a powerful story of debt and obligation set against the tourism boom in post-colonial TanzaniaA storyteller of understated brilliance, Abdulrazak Gurnah was awarded the 2021 Nobel prize in literature for his “uncompromising and compassionate penetration of the effects of colonialism and the fate of the refugee in the gulf between cultures and continents”. Born in Zanzibar, Gurnah, now 76, moved to Britain in 1968 as a refugee of the Zanzibar revolution. His books often feature people who leave what they know and arrive “in strange places, carrying little bits of jumbled luggage and suppressing secret and garbled ambitions”, to use the words of a character from his 2001 novel By the Sea. Theft, Gurnah’s first book since his Nobel win, is in part a continued inquiry into familiar themes of exile and memory, home, longing and loneliness. It is also a poignant portrait of love, friendship and betrayal, set against Tanzania’s tourism boom during the 1990s.The novel follows Karim,...

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7 h. ago Nobel prize winner says Rodrigo Duterte’s arrest sends powerful message: ‘Impunity ends’

Maria Ressa says forces that enabled former Philippines president’s rise are now fueling democratic backsliding in the West

Events

21 h. ago Polar Music Prize: what is 'the Nobel Prize of Music' as Queen becomes latest recipient?

The 2025 ceremony is set to take place in Stockholm later this year 🎶🎤🏆

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22 h. ago Duterte’s arrest gives ‘a sense impunity ends’, says Nobel peace prize winner

Maria Ressa said rules-based order ‘can perhaps still exist’ but social media is being used to undermine democracy around the worldThe arrest of Rodrigo Duterte is a welcome sign that the rules-based order continues to hold, the Nobel laureate Maria Ressa has said, even as the global order has been marred by the US “descending into hell” at the hands of the same forces that consumed the Philippines.Ressa’s remarks came after Duterte, the former president of the Philippines, made his first appearance before the international criminal court (ICC) in The Hague, accused of committing crimes against humanity during his brutal “war on drugs”. Continue reading...

Events

29 h. ago Herbie Hancock ‘thrilled, surprised and humbled’ by Polar Music Prize win

The jazz star said he was pleased to be among ‘great people’ in winning the award.

Politics

29 h. ago Queen, Herbie Hancock and Barbara Hannigan awarded 2025 Polar Music Prize

The prize is awarded to individuals, groups or institutions for excellence in the world of music.

Politics

5 d. ago The Guardian view on Trump and Ukraine: respite is possible, but resolution looks distant | Editorial

Will-they-won’t-they over a ceasefire does not change the underlying dynamics of US retreat from supporting Kyiv A three-year conflict has taken bewildering, lurching turns in under a fortnight. Less than two weeks after Donald Trump berated Volodymyr Zelenskyy, ejected him from the White House and cut off Ukraine’s support, he U-turned to threaten financial measures “that would be very bad for Russia” if it did not reach a deal with Kyiv. Ukraine’s acceptance of a 30-day ceasefire proposal, building on its own suggestion of a halt in air and maritime conflict, threw the onus on Moscow. On Thursday, Vladimir Putin claimed to support the idea in theory – but warned of “serious issues” to address.Ukraine’s agreement prompted the resumption of US intelligence sharing and military aid, which may well have been Kyiv’s primary aim. Mr Trump would like to take the credit – and perhaps aspires to a Nobel prize – for a peace deal. Mr Trump, who was hosting Nato’s sec...

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1 week ago ‘AI will become very good at manipulating emotions’: Kazuo Ishiguro on the future of fiction and truth

On the 20th anniversary of Never Let Me Go, the Nobel prize-winning novelist talks about the role of the author in a post-truth world – and why he’s ‘not a great writer of prose’• Anne Enright and others celebrate 20 years of Never Let Me GoI arrive at Kazuo Ishiguro’s central London flat on an iron-cold, blustery and grey day, and am immediately absorbed into a scene of quiet comfort and calm; the lights are low, the furnishings white, the coffee – made by Ishiguro’s wife, Lorna, before she absents herself to go to the cinema – hot and delicious. Ishiguro, now 70 and in receipt of a Nobel prize in literature and a knighthood, has fetched the elegant cakes himself, and is immediately solicitous. Am I chilly? Am I hungry? Am I worried whether my device will record our conversation?It’s an attentiveness to minute, even mundane detail that is evident in all his work. From The Unconsoled to The Remains of the Day, Ishiguro is the creator of some of the most unsettling and memo...

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1 week ago ‘The definition of a classic’: Kazuo Ishiguro’s Never Let Me Go at 20

A Booker-winning author, a Nobel prize-winning scientist and the directors of the film and stage adaptations on why Ishiguro’s dystopian tale still speaks to us today• ‘AI will become very good at manipulating emotions’: an exclusive interview with Kazuo IshiguroAnne EnrightBooker-winning author and professor of fiction at University College DublinMy writing students all know and love Never Let Me Go. Year after year, they choose to discuss it more than any other suggested title. These students are all ages but mostly young, so their affinity may have something to do with how tenderly Ishiguro writes about youth, innocence and friendship. The novel contains some of the tropes popular with readers of young adult fiction; there is an elite boarding school with beautiful grounds, various styles of guardian and no sign of any parents. Narrated by Kathy, who tells us about her friends Ruth and Tommy, the style is accessibly conversational and it contains a melancholy seriousnes...

Politics

1 week ago Trump has 'every chance' to win Nobel Peace Prize as ally claims 'no one deserves it more'

In a complete "head-scratcher", Donald Trump has somehow been given odds of just 4/1 by bookies to win the Nobel Peace Prize for his actions in Gaza and Ukraine

Politics

2 w. ago Tariffs can help US workers. But Trump’s doing them all wrong

Trump’s levies won’t bring factories home. But combined with infrastructure investment, protectionism can be a progressive boonIn the run-up to the 2024 election, a lot of people were ringing alarms about Donald Trump’s tariffs. Kamala Harris called Trump’s policies a “tax on the American people” and warned of sky-high prices. According to the Nobel Prize winning economist Joseph Stiglitz, they are “very bad for America and for the world”. His fellow Nobel laureate Paul Krugman called them “small, ugly, and stupid” (seemingly unaware that he was invoking that joke in Annie Hall about the food being bad and the portions too small). More recently, the whirlwind tariff drama of the past two months – first a 25% tariff on Mexico and Canada, then a 30-day “pause” on that policy, a plan to raise tariffs on steel, aluminum and agricultural goods, plus an across the board tariff hike on China – has generated yet more frenzied debate about the danger of tariffs.Observers aren’t wrong to crit...

Politics

2 w. ago Tariffs can help US workers. But Trump’s doing them all wrong | Dustin Guastella

Trump’s levies won’t bring factories home. But combined with infrastructure investment, protectionism can be a progressive boonIn the run-up to the 2024 election, a lot of people were ringing alarms about Donald Trump’s tariffs. Kamala Harris called Trump’s policies a “tax on the American people” and warned of sky-high prices. According to the Nobel prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz, they are “very bad for America and for the world”. His fellow Nobel laureate Paul Krugman called them “small, ugly, and stupid”. More recently, the whirlwind tariff drama of the past two months – first a 25% tariff on Mexico and Canada, then a 30-day “pause” on that policy, a plan to raise tariffs on steel, aluminum and agricultural goods, plus an across the board tariff hike on China – has generated yet more frenzied debate about the danger of tariffs.Observers aren’t wrong to criticize the US president’s policies. His proposed tariffs seem unlikely to improve what ails the US economy. Worse, app...

Politics

2 w. ago Lech Wałęsa expresses ‘horror and distaste’ at Trump’s treatment of Zelenskyy

Ex-Polish leader, who won Nobel prize for pro-democracy efforts, compares meeting to a communist interrogationThe former Polish president and Nobel peace prize winner Lech Wałęsa has signed a letter to Donald Trump expressing “horror and distaste” at his argument with the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, in the White House last week.The letter, signed by Wałęsa and more than 30 former Polish political prisoners held during the communist era, said Trump and his vice-president’s demands that Zelenskyy show gratitude were “insulting” in the face of the Ukrainian country’s fight for freedom. Continue reading...

Politics

3 w. ago Trump says he ‘had very good talks with Putin’ and again criticizes Ukraine – live

US president also accuses Kyiv of talking ‘tough’ but having few bargaining chips in latest remarks in feud with Ukrainian president ZelenskyyNational security adviser Mike Waltz told a crowd of Donald Trump loyalists that he believes the president will receive the Nobel peace prize.“This is the presidency of peace. He’s going to end the war in Europe. He is going to end the wars in the Middle East. He is going to reinvest the United States and our leadership in our own hemisphere, from the Arctic to the border to Panama all the way down to our good friends in Argentina,” Waltz told the Conservative Political Action Conference.The pause comes after CNN reported on Wednesday that the mass terminations, which could affect over 50,000 civilian employees across the Pentagon, could run afoul of Title 10 section 129a of the US code. Following that report, Pentagon lawyers began reviewing the legality of the planned terminations more closely, the officials said.That law says that the secre...

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3 w. ago Mike Waltz insists Ukraine will sign mineral deal — and Trump will get a Nobel Peace Prize when war’s over

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has previously rejected an agreement for American control of much of his country’s rare earth minerals

Politics

3 w. ago Trump refuses to admit Putin started Ukraine war as adviser tells CPAC he will win Nobel Peace Prize: Live

President invited to row back on criticism of Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelensky but instead doubles down, declaring: ‘He makes it very hard to make deals’

Politics

3 w. ago Senate passes budget funding Trump’s mass deportations; Pentagon reportedly delays firing civilians – US politics live

Republicans approve spending plan that will pay for hardline immigration policies; sackings on hold amid concerns they could hit military readinessMass firings could cause ‘monumental’ bill, say expertsNational security adviser Mike Waltz told a crowd of Donald Trump loyalists that he believes the president will receive the Nobel peace prize.“This is the presidency of peace. He’s going to end the war in Europe. He is going to end the wars in the Middle East. He is going to reinvest the United States and our leadership in our own hemisphere, from the Arctic to the border to Panama all the way down to our good friends in Argentina,” Waltz told the Conservative Political Action Conference.The pause comes after CNN reported on Wednesday that the mass terminations, which could affect over 50,000 civilian employees across the Pentagon, could run afoul of Title 10 section 129a of the US code. Following that report, Pentagon lawyers began reviewing the legality of the planned terminations m...

Politics

4 w. ago ‘What a project, what a challenge!’: Africa’s leading architect gives Thomas Sankara a proper place of rest

Pritzker prize-winner Francis Kéré has designed a memorial to honour ‘Africa’s Che Guevara’, Burkina Faso’s visionary president who was assassinated in 1987Francis Kéré was the first African architect to win the Pritzker prize when he scooped the “Nobel prize of architecture” in 2022. A native of Gando, a small village in Burkina Faso’s Central-East region, Kéré was once criticised by his neighbours for building a school for the village before constructing a house for his parents. But that project has led to commissions including the new parliament building in Benin, the Goethe Institute Dakar and the Las Vegas Museum of Art.“I wanted to give something to my people, and that has given me an international career,” he says of his decision to build the school. Continue reading...

Events

4 w. ago MAGA loyalists tear into 'evil' Europeans threatening not to EVER give Trump a Nobel Peace Prize

Supporters of President Donald Trump on Monday reacted to a threat from a European leader warning him that they were the ones who controlled the recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize.

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