Nobel Literature Prize: the 15 past winners

(AFP)

Romanian-born Herta Mueller of Germany was on Thursday awarded this year's Nobel Literature Prize by the Swedish Academy.

Here follows a list of the 15 most recent winners of the prize:

2009: Herta Mueller (Germany)

2008: Jean-Marie Gustave Le Clezio (France)

2007: Doris Lessing (Britain)

2006: Orhan Pamuk (Turkey)

2005: Harold Pinter (Britain)

2004: Elfriede Jelinek (Austria)

2003: J.M. Coetzee (South Africa)

2002: Imre Kertesz (Hungary)

2001: V.S. Naipaul (Britain)

2000: Gao Xingjian (France)

1999: Guenter Grass (Germany)

1998: Jose Saramago (Portugal)

1997: Dario Fo (Italy)

1996: Wislawa Szymborska (Poland)

1995: Seamus Heaney (Ireland)