Orhan Pamuk

Awarded by the Swedish Academy for the most outstanding work for producing a novel with realistic tendency, 2006’s literature prize went to Turkish writer Orhan Pamuk.
Pamuk, born in 1952 in Istanbul grew up when the environments of a Traditional Ottoman family became more westernised, this making it a fantastic story for his first book “Mr. Cevdet and His Sons” following a family through 3 different generations.
Pamuk was educated at Robert College in Istanbul and studied architecture by force of his family at Istanbul Technical University; three years later he left of his own accord to become a full time writer and graduated from the Institute of Journalism at Istanbul University in 1976. During 1985 – 1988 he became a visiting scholar to Colombia University, New York and then returned to his home town of Istanbul in 2006. Now he is a visiting Professor at Colombia.
Through Pamuk’s novels he has gained a reputation for confronting controversial issues and has faced legal actions in his homeland, including prosecution. These cases were later dropped.
Pamuk has written and published 6 books in English one of these been “The White Castle”, primarily a historical novel set in 17th-century Istanbul. Overall the books have been translated into 40 different languages and typically deal with clashes between civilizations and Islam's relationship with secular nationalism.
The Swedish Academy said: "In the quest for the melancholic soul of his native city, (Pamuk) has discovered new symbols for the clash and interlacing of cultures."