Photo : Collected
Jila Mossaed fled Iran for Sweden in 1986, a 38-year-old poet who spoke no Swedish. Three decades later, she became the first foreigner inducted into Sweden's highest language authority, the Swedish Academy, which awards the Nobel Prize in Literature.
Now she writes in Farsi and Swedish, but Mossaed struggled for years to learn Swedish and still stumbles over pronunciation, she told AFP in the halls of the Academy, founded in 1786 by King Gustav III to promote the Swedish language and literature.
The 76-year-old, whose work explores life, death, politics, love, exile and nature, never expected to join the Academy in 2018.
The 18 Academy members are appointed for life.
"It's such an unbelievable honour. I'm so proud of it," she said, her dark eyes beaming.
Mossaed is tight-lipped on the Nobel prize to be announced Thursday, but says she sees her Academy role in general as broadening horizons.
"I carry with me an ancient, rich language spoken by 300 million people."
"To open new windows to unknown literature and introduce it is an interesting and important contribution," she said.
In 1986, Mossaed fled Iran with her two young children after a book of her poetry received "very threatening and humiliating" criticism from the Islamic Republic's authorities.
"Soldiers came to my house with weapons and took many things," she recalled.
She was summoned to a censorship office. "When I left I thought, 'This isn't my country anymore'."
"I had no plan. I didn't know what it meant to be a refugee or which country I would end up in."
A smuggler told her Sweden and Denmark were easiest to get to.
She knew of Ingmar Bergman, August Strindberg and Pippi Longstocking, so Sweden it was.
Messenger/Disha
