Ghent author Stefan Hertmans, best known for his 2013 book War and Turpentine, has been nominated by Dutch writers for the Nobel Prize in Literature, due to be announced on 8 October.

Potential laureates have been submitted to the Swedish Academy by a select group of experts, in this case, the Royal Academy for Dutch Language and Literature (KANTL). A Dutch-language writer has yet to win the prestigious prize.

Shrouded in secrecy, the Nobel Committee will draw up a shortlist from among the nominees before making its final decision.

Hertmans, 75, is an internationally renowned writer who has published novels, short stories, plays and poetry over the past 45 years.

In addition to winning almost every Dutch-language prize, he was awarded the AKO Literature Prize and nominated for the 2017 Man Booker International Prize for War and Turpentine. It was this best-selling work of historical fiction, translated into dozens of language, that sealed his global reputation.

Lying at the crossroads of novel, biography, autobiography and history, with inset essays, meditations and pictures, its starting point was Hertmans’ grandfather’s diaries; recollections of the first world war.

The work is ultimately about the transmission from one generation to another of history, events, memories and stories, while also reflecting on working-class Flemish life.

Hertmans, who is affiliated to Ghent University College and Ghent University, also wrote the novel The Ascent, which was inspired by the history of the German SS officer who once lived in his Ghent home.

Photo: ©Wikimedia Commons:Michiel Hendryckx