The awarding of the Nobel Prize in Literature to Annie Ernaux caused irritation among Jewish organizations in Germany because of her political stance.
“Awarding Annie Ernaux the Nobel Prize in Literature is a setback for the global fight against anti-Semitism and misanthropy,” said the President of the Central Council of Jews in Germany, Josef Schuster, at the request of the German Press Agency on Wednesday. He cannot and does not want to judge the literary work of the Frenchwoman, but the effect of the award goes far beyond the professional world.
Ernaux is accused of being close to the BDS movement. BDS stands for “Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions”. This is aimed, among other things, at goods from Israel and cooperation in culture and science. Shortly after the Nobel Committee’s announcement last Thursday, allegations of anti-Semitism against the author were made in the Israeli press. The 82-year-old herself did not comment on this.
Among other things, Ernaux called for a boycott of the “France-Israel” cultural season in 2018 together with 80 cultural and artistic workers, including the recently deceased filmmaker Jean-Luc Godard, and in 2019 for a boycott of the Eurovision Song Contest in Tel Aviv.
“Annie Ernaux’s staunch support of the BDS movement, her public demonization of Israel as an ‘apartheid state,’ or her calls for the release of a Lebanese terrorist and murderer are not the lapses of a politically ill-considered writer, but evidence of a clearly anti-Semitic stance,” Schuster said. “The signal that goes out from this Nobel Prize is extremely disturbing for Jews in Germany, especially after the scandalous documenta.”
The acting vice-president of the Auschwitz Committee, Christoph Heubner, said: “It is more than a pity when a great writer loses herself in the hateful and one-sided world of hatred of Israel and the anti-Semitism that goes with it, and thus thwarts her literary work. She becomes at in her Nobel Prize speech to explain herself and to go beyond the limits of her prejudices. She owes it to her readers, and not only in Israel.”
