Herta Muller was awarded the 2009 Nobel Prize in Literature.  The Romanian-born German author was cited for depicting "the landscape of the dispossessed" through a "concentration of poetry and frankness of prose."

She is the author of The Land of Green Plums and The Appointment: A Novel.

The announcement was made via a live web cast on nobelprize.org, from the Swedish Academy, Stockholm, Sweden, on Thursday, October 8, 1:00 p.m. CET, 11:00 a.m. GMT.

Peter Englund, Permanent Secretary of the Swedish Academy, gave an interview about the 2009 Nobel Prize in Literature directly following the announcement.

The Nobel Prize in Literature is one of the five original prizes created by the will of Alfred Nobel, the inventor of dynamite.  It is given to the author who has produced "in the field of literature the most outstanding work in an ideal direction."  It is unclear what Nobel meant by the phrase "ideal direction."  The award was first granted in 1901.  It currently carries a monetary prize worth about $1.4 million (US).  105 authors have previously received the prize.  The youngest was Rudyard Kipling at 42.  The oldest was Doris Lessing at 88.