WORLD PRIZE OF HUMANISM WINNERS
2007 - Daisaku Ikeda, Japan
Daisaku Ikeda is a Buddhist philosopher, peacebuilder, educator, author and poet. He is the third president of the Soka Gakkai lay Buddhist organization and the founding president of the Soka Gakkai International (SGI), which is today one of the world's largest and most diverse lay Buddhist organizations, promoting a philosophy of character development and social engagement for peace.
Daisaku Ikeda heads Soka Gakkai International, one of the world's largest and most diverse Buddhist movements.
Ikeda is founder of the Soka (value-creation) schools, a nondenominational school system based on an ideal of fostering each student's unique creative potential and cultivating an ethic of peace, social contribution and global consciousness. The school system runs from kindergarten through graduate study and includes a university in Tokyo, Japan, and another in California, USA.
Ikeda is a staunch proponent of dialogue as the foundation of peace. Since the 1970s he has pursued dialogue with a wide range of individuals around the world in political, cultural, educational and academic fields. Over 50 of these have been published in book form, with people such as Mikhail Gorbachev, Elise Boulding, Joseph Rotblat and André Malraux. In furtherance of his vision of fostering dialogue and solidarity for peace, Ikeda has founded a number of independent, nonprofit research institutes that develop cross-cultural, interdisciplinary collaboration on diverse issues: the Boston Research Center for the 21st Century (renamed the Ikeda Center for Peace, Learning, and Dialogue in 2009), the Toda Institute for Global Peace and Policy Research and the Institute of Oriental Philosophy. The Min-On Concert Association and the Tokyo Fuji Art Museum promote mutual understanding and friendship between different national cultures through the arts.
Ikeda is a prolific writer who has published more than 100 works, ranging from Buddhist philosophy to biographical essays, poetry, children's stories and photographic collections.
Life
Ikeda was born in Tokyo, Japan, on January 2, 1928, the fifth of eight children, to a family of seaweed farmers. The devastation and senseless horror he witnessed as a teenager during World War II gave birth to a lifelong passion to work for peace, rooting out the fundamental causes of human conflict.
For much of his early life Ikeda struggled against ill health, nearly succumbing, in his teens, to the ravages of tuberculosis, one of the leading killer diseases at the time. In 1947, at the age of 19, he met Josei Toda (1900-58), educator and leader of the Soka Gakkai lay Buddhist society whose activities were based on the philosophy of the thirteenth-century Buddhist teacher and reformer Nichiren. Ikeda found in Toda an open and unaffected person, a man of unshakable conviction with a gift for explaining profound Buddhist concepts in logical, accessible terms. He soon found employment at one of Toda's companies and later completed his education under the tutelage of Toda, who became his mentor in life.
In May 1960, two years after Toda's death, Ikeda, then 32, succeeded him as president of the Soka Gakkai. Under his leadership, the movement began an era of innovation and expansion, becoming actively engaged in cultural and educational endeavors worldwide. Ikeda has dedicated himself to fulfilling Toda's dreams by developing initiatives in the areas of peace, culture and education.
In 1975, Ikeda became the first president of the Soka Gakkai International (SGI), now a global network linking over 12 million members in some 190 countries and territories.
The central tenet of Ikeda's thought, and of Buddhism, is the fundamental sanctity of life, a value which Ikeda sees as the key to lasting peace and human happiness. In his view, global peace relies ultimately on a self-directed transformation within the life of the individual, rather than on societal or structural reforms alone. This idea is expressed most succinctly in a passage in his best-known work, The Human Revolution, Ikeda's novelization of the Soka Gakkai's history and ideals: "A great inner revolution in just a single individual will help achieve a change in the destiny of a nation and, further, will enable a change in the destiny of all humankind."
Ikeda has two sons, Hiromasa and Takahiro, and lives in Tokyo with his wife, Kaneko.
DOWNLOAD PDF BOOK ABOUT DAISAKU IKEDA.
Daisaku Ikeda heads Soka Gakkai International, one of the world's largest and most diverse Buddhist movements.
Ikeda is founder of the Soka (value-creation) schools, a nondenominational school system based on an ideal of fostering each student's unique creative potential and cultivating an ethic of peace, social contribution and global consciousness. The school system runs from kindergarten through graduate study and includes a university in Tokyo, Japan, and another in California, USA.
Ikeda is a staunch proponent of dialogue as the foundation of peace. Since the 1970s he has pursued dialogue with a wide range of individuals around the world in political, cultural, educational and academic fields. Over 50 of these have been published in book form, with people such as Mikhail Gorbachev, Elise Boulding, Joseph Rotblat and André Malraux. In furtherance of his vision of fostering dialogue and solidarity for peace, Ikeda has founded a number of independent, nonprofit research institutes that develop cross-cultural, interdisciplinary collaboration on diverse issues: the Boston Research Center for the 21st Century (renamed the Ikeda Center for Peace, Learning, and Dialogue in 2009), the Toda Institute for Global Peace and Policy Research and the Institute of Oriental Philosophy. The Min-On Concert Association and the Tokyo Fuji Art Museum promote mutual understanding and friendship between different national cultures through the arts.
Ikeda is a prolific writer who has published more than 100 works, ranging from Buddhist philosophy to biographical essays, poetry, children's stories and photographic collections.
Life
Ikeda was born in Tokyo, Japan, on January 2, 1928, the fifth of eight children, to a family of seaweed farmers. The devastation and senseless horror he witnessed as a teenager during World War II gave birth to a lifelong passion to work for peace, rooting out the fundamental causes of human conflict.
For much of his early life Ikeda struggled against ill health, nearly succumbing, in his teens, to the ravages of tuberculosis, one of the leading killer diseases at the time. In 1947, at the age of 19, he met Josei Toda (1900-58), educator and leader of the Soka Gakkai lay Buddhist society whose activities were based on the philosophy of the thirteenth-century Buddhist teacher and reformer Nichiren. Ikeda found in Toda an open and unaffected person, a man of unshakable conviction with a gift for explaining profound Buddhist concepts in logical, accessible terms. He soon found employment at one of Toda's companies and later completed his education under the tutelage of Toda, who became his mentor in life.
In May 1960, two years after Toda's death, Ikeda, then 32, succeeded him as president of the Soka Gakkai. Under his leadership, the movement began an era of innovation and expansion, becoming actively engaged in cultural and educational endeavors worldwide. Ikeda has dedicated himself to fulfilling Toda's dreams by developing initiatives in the areas of peace, culture and education.
In 1975, Ikeda became the first president of the Soka Gakkai International (SGI), now a global network linking over 12 million members in some 190 countries and territories.
The central tenet of Ikeda's thought, and of Buddhism, is the fundamental sanctity of life, a value which Ikeda sees as the key to lasting peace and human happiness. In his view, global peace relies ultimately on a self-directed transformation within the life of the individual, rather than on societal or structural reforms alone. This idea is expressed most succinctly in a passage in his best-known work, The Human Revolution, Ikeda's novelization of the Soka Gakkai's history and ideals: "A great inner revolution in just a single individual will help achieve a change in the destiny of a nation and, further, will enable a change in the destiny of all humankind."
Ikeda has two sons, Hiromasa and Takahiro, and lives in Tokyo with his wife, Kaneko.
DOWNLOAD PDF BOOK ABOUT DAISAKU IKEDA.
2008 - Manoel De Oliveira, Portugal
Manoel Cândido Pinto de Oliveira (born December 11, 1908) is a Portuguese film director and screenwriter born in Cedofeita, Porto. He first began making films in 1927, when he and some friends attempted to make a film about World War I. In 1931 he completed his first film Douro, Faina Fluvial, a documentary about his home city Porto made in the city symphony genre. He made his feature film debut in 1942 with Aniki-Bóbó and continued to make shorts and documentaries for the next 30 years, gaining a minimal amount of recognition without being considered a major world film director. Among the numerous factors that prevented Oliveira from making more films during this time period were the political situation in Portugal, family obligations and money.
In 1971 Oliveira made his second feature narrative film Past and Present, a social satire that both set the standard for his film career afterwards and gained him recognition in the global film community. He continued making films of growing ambition throughout the 1970s and 1980s, gaining critical acclaim and numerous awards. Since the late 1980s he has been one of the most prolific working film directors and continues to make an average of one film per year past the age of 100. In March 2008 he was reported to be the oldest active film director in the world and is possibly the third oldest film director ever after George Abbott, who lived to be 107, and retired Spanish film director Miguel Morayta, who is currently over a year older than Oliveira. He is also the only filmmaker whose active career has spanned from the silent era to the digital age. Among his numerous awards are two Career Golden Lions from the Venice Film Festival.
DOWNLOAD PDF BOOK ABOUT MANOEL DE OLIVEIRA.
In 1971 Oliveira made his second feature narrative film Past and Present, a social satire that both set the standard for his film career afterwards and gained him recognition in the global film community. He continued making films of growing ambition throughout the 1970s and 1980s, gaining critical acclaim and numerous awards. Since the late 1980s he has been one of the most prolific working film directors and continues to make an average of one film per year past the age of 100. In March 2008 he was reported to be the oldest active film director in the world and is possibly the third oldest film director ever after George Abbott, who lived to be 107, and retired Spanish film director Miguel Morayta, who is currently over a year older than Oliveira. He is also the only filmmaker whose active career has spanned from the silent era to the digital age. Among his numerous awards are two Career Golden Lions from the Venice Film Festival.
DOWNLOAD PDF BOOK ABOUT MANOEL DE OLIVEIRA.
2009 - Aleksandar Slozhenitsyn, Russia
Solzhenitsyn, Aleksandr (Isayevich) (b. Dec. 11, 1918, Kislovodsk, Russia [U.S.S.R.]), Russian novelist and historian, who was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature for 1970 and was exiled from the Soviet Union in 1974.
Solzhenitsyn was born into a family of Cossack intellectuals and brought up primarily by his mother (his father was killed in an accident before his birth). He attended the University of Rostov-na-Donu, graduating in mathematics, and took correspondence courses in literature at Moscow State University. He fought in World War II, achieving the rank of captain of artillery; in 1945, however, he was arrested for writing a letter in which he criticized Joseph Stalin and spent eight years in prisons and labour camps, after which he spent three more years in enforced exile. Rehabilitated in 1956, he was allowed to settle in Ryazan, in central Russia, where he became a mathematics teacher and began to write.
Encouraged by the loosening of government restraints on cultural life that was a hallmark of the de-Stalinizing policies of the early 1960s, Solzhenitsyn submitted his short novel Odin den iz zhizni Ivana Denisovicha (1962; One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich) to the leading Soviet literary periodical Novy Mir ("New World"). The novel quickly appeared in that journal's pages and met with immediate popularity, Solzhenitsyn becoming an instant celebrity. Ivan Denisovich, based on Solzhenitsyn's own experiences, described a typical day in the life of an inmate of a forced-labour camp during the Stalin era. The impression made on the public by the book's simple, direct language and by the obvious authority with which it treated the daily struggles and material hardships of camp life was magnified by its being one of the first Soviet literary works of the post-Stalin era to directly describe such a life. The book produced a political sensation both abroad and in the Soviet Union, where it inspired a number of other writers to produce accounts of their imprisonment under Stalin's regime.
Solzhenitsyn's period of official favour proved to be short-lived, however. Ideological strictures on cultural activity in the Soviet Union tightened with Nikita Khrushchev's fall from power in 1964, and Solzhenitsyn met first with increasing criticism and then with overt harassment from the authorities when he emerged as an eloquent opponent of repressive government policies. After the publication of a collection of his short stories in 1963, he was denied further official publication of his work, and he resorted to circulating them in the form of samizdat ("self-published") literature--i.e., as illegal literature circulated clandestinely--as well as publishing them abroad.
The following years were marked by the foreign publication of several ambitious novels that secured Solzhenitsyn's international literary reputation. V kruge pervom (1968; The First Circle) was indirectly based on his years spent working in a prison research institute as a mathematician. The book traces the varying responses of scientists at work on research for the secret police as they must decide whether to cooperate with the authorities and thus remain within the research prison or to refuse their services and be thrust back into the brutal conditions of the labour camps. Rakovy korpus (1968; Cancer Ward) was based on Solzhenitsyn's hospitalization and successful treatment for terminally diagnosed cancer during his forced exile in Kazakhstan during the mid-1950s. The main character, like Solzhenitsyn himself, was a recently released inmate of the camps.
In 1970 Solzhenitsyn was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature, but he declined to go to Stockholm to receive the prize for fear he would not be readmitted to the Soviet Union by the government upon his return. His next novel to be published outside the Soviet Union was Avgust 1914 (1971; August 1914), a historical novel treating Germany's crushing victory over Russia in their initial military engagement of World War I, the Battle of Tannenburg. The novel centred on several characters in the doomed 1st Army of the Russian general A.V. Samsonov and indirectly explored the weaknesses of the tsarist regime that eventually led to its downfall by revolution in 1917.
In December 1973 the first parts of Arkhipelag Gulag (The Gulag Archipelago) were published in Paris after a copy of the manuscript had been seized in the Soviet Union by the KGB. (Gulag is an acronym formed from the official Soviet designation of its system of prisons and labour camps.) The Gulag Archipelago is Solzhenitsyn's attempt to compile a literary-historical record of the vast system of prisons and labour camps that came into being shortly after the Bolsheviks seized power in Russia (1917) and that underwent an enormous expansion during the rule of Stalin (1924-53). Various sections of the work describe the arrest, interrogation, conviction, transportation, and imprisonment of the Gulag's victims as practiced by Soviet authorities over four decades. The work mingles historical exposition and Solzhenitsyn's own autobiographical accounts with the voluminous personal testimony of other inmates that he collected and committed to memory during his imprisonment.
Upon publication of the first volume of The Gulag Archipelago, Solzhenitsyn was immediately attacked in the Soviet press. Despite the intense interest in his fate that was shown in the West, he was arrested and charged with treason on Feb. 12, 1974. Solzhenitsyn was exiled from the Soviet Union on the following day, and in December he took possession of his Nobel Prize.
In 1975 a documentary novel, Lenin v Tsyurikhe: glavy (Lenin in Zurich: Chapters), appeared. Subsequently, Solzhenitsyn traveled to the United States, where he eventually settled on a secluded estate in Cavendish, Vt. The second and third volumes of The Gulag Archipelago were published in 1974-75. Solzhenitsyn produced two books of nonfiction in 1980: The Oak and the Calf, which portrayed literary life in the Soviet Union, and the brief The Mortal Danger, which analyzed what he perceived to be the perils of American misconceptions about Russia. In 1983 an extensively expanded and revised version of August 1914 appeared in Russian as the first part of a projected series, Krasnoe koleso (The Red Wheel); other volumes (or uzly ["knots"]) in the series were Oktyabr 1916 ("October 1916"), Mart 1917 ("March 1917"), and Aprel 1917 ("April 1917").
In presenting alternatives to the Soviet regime, Solzhenitsyn tended to reject Western emphases on democracy and individual freedom and instead favoured the formation of a benevolent authoritarian regime that would draw upon the resources of Russia's traditional Christian values. The introduction of glasnost ("openness") in the late 1980s brought renewed access to Solzhenitsyn's work in the Soviet Union. In 1989 the Soviet literary magazine Novy Mir published the first officially approved excerpts from The Gulag Archipelago. Other works were also published, and Solzhenitsyn's Soviet citizenship was officially restored in 1990. He ended his exile and returned to Russia in 1994.
DOWNLOAD PDF BOOK ABOUT ALEKSANDAR SLOZHENITSYN.
Solzhenitsyn was born into a family of Cossack intellectuals and brought up primarily by his mother (his father was killed in an accident before his birth). He attended the University of Rostov-na-Donu, graduating in mathematics, and took correspondence courses in literature at Moscow State University. He fought in World War II, achieving the rank of captain of artillery; in 1945, however, he was arrested for writing a letter in which he criticized Joseph Stalin and spent eight years in prisons and labour camps, after which he spent three more years in enforced exile. Rehabilitated in 1956, he was allowed to settle in Ryazan, in central Russia, where he became a mathematics teacher and began to write.
Encouraged by the loosening of government restraints on cultural life that was a hallmark of the de-Stalinizing policies of the early 1960s, Solzhenitsyn submitted his short novel Odin den iz zhizni Ivana Denisovicha (1962; One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich) to the leading Soviet literary periodical Novy Mir ("New World"). The novel quickly appeared in that journal's pages and met with immediate popularity, Solzhenitsyn becoming an instant celebrity. Ivan Denisovich, based on Solzhenitsyn's own experiences, described a typical day in the life of an inmate of a forced-labour camp during the Stalin era. The impression made on the public by the book's simple, direct language and by the obvious authority with which it treated the daily struggles and material hardships of camp life was magnified by its being one of the first Soviet literary works of the post-Stalin era to directly describe such a life. The book produced a political sensation both abroad and in the Soviet Union, where it inspired a number of other writers to produce accounts of their imprisonment under Stalin's regime.
Solzhenitsyn's period of official favour proved to be short-lived, however. Ideological strictures on cultural activity in the Soviet Union tightened with Nikita Khrushchev's fall from power in 1964, and Solzhenitsyn met first with increasing criticism and then with overt harassment from the authorities when he emerged as an eloquent opponent of repressive government policies. After the publication of a collection of his short stories in 1963, he was denied further official publication of his work, and he resorted to circulating them in the form of samizdat ("self-published") literature--i.e., as illegal literature circulated clandestinely--as well as publishing them abroad.
The following years were marked by the foreign publication of several ambitious novels that secured Solzhenitsyn's international literary reputation. V kruge pervom (1968; The First Circle) was indirectly based on his years spent working in a prison research institute as a mathematician. The book traces the varying responses of scientists at work on research for the secret police as they must decide whether to cooperate with the authorities and thus remain within the research prison or to refuse their services and be thrust back into the brutal conditions of the labour camps. Rakovy korpus (1968; Cancer Ward) was based on Solzhenitsyn's hospitalization and successful treatment for terminally diagnosed cancer during his forced exile in Kazakhstan during the mid-1950s. The main character, like Solzhenitsyn himself, was a recently released inmate of the camps.
In 1970 Solzhenitsyn was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature, but he declined to go to Stockholm to receive the prize for fear he would not be readmitted to the Soviet Union by the government upon his return. His next novel to be published outside the Soviet Union was Avgust 1914 (1971; August 1914), a historical novel treating Germany's crushing victory over Russia in their initial military engagement of World War I, the Battle of Tannenburg. The novel centred on several characters in the doomed 1st Army of the Russian general A.V. Samsonov and indirectly explored the weaknesses of the tsarist regime that eventually led to its downfall by revolution in 1917.
In December 1973 the first parts of Arkhipelag Gulag (The Gulag Archipelago) were published in Paris after a copy of the manuscript had been seized in the Soviet Union by the KGB. (Gulag is an acronym formed from the official Soviet designation of its system of prisons and labour camps.) The Gulag Archipelago is Solzhenitsyn's attempt to compile a literary-historical record of the vast system of prisons and labour camps that came into being shortly after the Bolsheviks seized power in Russia (1917) and that underwent an enormous expansion during the rule of Stalin (1924-53). Various sections of the work describe the arrest, interrogation, conviction, transportation, and imprisonment of the Gulag's victims as practiced by Soviet authorities over four decades. The work mingles historical exposition and Solzhenitsyn's own autobiographical accounts with the voluminous personal testimony of other inmates that he collected and committed to memory during his imprisonment.
Upon publication of the first volume of The Gulag Archipelago, Solzhenitsyn was immediately attacked in the Soviet press. Despite the intense interest in his fate that was shown in the West, he was arrested and charged with treason on Feb. 12, 1974. Solzhenitsyn was exiled from the Soviet Union on the following day, and in December he took possession of his Nobel Prize.
In 1975 a documentary novel, Lenin v Tsyurikhe: glavy (Lenin in Zurich: Chapters), appeared. Subsequently, Solzhenitsyn traveled to the United States, where he eventually settled on a secluded estate in Cavendish, Vt. The second and third volumes of The Gulag Archipelago were published in 1974-75. Solzhenitsyn produced two books of nonfiction in 1980: The Oak and the Calf, which portrayed literary life in the Soviet Union, and the brief The Mortal Danger, which analyzed what he perceived to be the perils of American misconceptions about Russia. In 1983 an extensively expanded and revised version of August 1914 appeared in Russian as the first part of a projected series, Krasnoe koleso (The Red Wheel); other volumes (or uzly ["knots"]) in the series were Oktyabr 1916 ("October 1916"), Mart 1917 ("March 1917"), and Aprel 1917 ("April 1917").
In presenting alternatives to the Soviet regime, Solzhenitsyn tended to reject Western emphases on democracy and individual freedom and instead favoured the formation of a benevolent authoritarian regime that would draw upon the resources of Russia's traditional Christian values. The introduction of glasnost ("openness") in the late 1980s brought renewed access to Solzhenitsyn's work in the Soviet Union. In 1989 the Soviet literary magazine Novy Mir published the first officially approved excerpts from The Gulag Archipelago. Other works were also published, and Solzhenitsyn's Soviet citizenship was officially restored in 1990. He ended his exile and returned to Russia in 1994.
DOWNLOAD PDF BOOK ABOUT ALEKSANDAR SLOZHENITSYN.
2010 - Ravi Shankar, India
Ravi Shankar, the legendary sitarist and composer is India's most esteemed musical Ambassador and a singular phenomenon in the classical music worlds of East and West. As a performer, composer, teacher and writer, he has done more for Indian music than any other musician. He is well known for his pioneering work in bringing Indian music to the West. This however, he did only after long years of dedicated study under his illustrious guru Baba Allaudin Khan and after making a name for himself in India.
Always ahead of his time, Ravi Shankar has written three concertos for sitar and orchestra, last one of which in 2008. He has also authored violin-sitar compositions for Yehudi Menuhin and himself, music for flute virtuoso Jean Pierre Rampal, music for Hosan Yamamoto, master of the Shakuhachi and Musumi Miyashita - Koto virtuoso, and has collaborated with Phillip Glass (Passages).
George Harrison produced and participated in two record albums, "Shankar Family & Friends" and "Festival of India" both composed by Ravi Shankar. Ravi Shankar has also composed for ballets and films in India, Canada, Europe and the United States. The latter of which includes the films "Charly," "Gandhi," and the "Apu Trilogy".
In the period of the awakening of the younger generation in the mid 60's, Ravi Shankar gave three memorable concerts - Monterey Pop Festival, Concert for Bangla Desh, and The Woodstock Festival.
Ravi Shankar is an honourary member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters and is a member of the United Nations International Rostrum of composers. He has received many awards and honours from his own country and from all over the world, including fourteen doctorates, the Bharat Ratna, the Padma Vibhushan, Desikottam,Padma Bhushan of 1967, the Music Council UNESCO award 1975, the Magsaysay Award from Manila, two Grammy's, the Fukuoka grand Prize from Japan, the Polar Music Prize of 1998, the Crystal award from Davos, with the title 'Global Ambassador' to name some.
In 1986 Ravi Shankar was nominated as a member of the Rajya Sabha, India's upper house of Parliament.
Deeply moved by the plight of more than eight million refugees who came to India during the Bangla Desh Freedom struggle from Pakistan, Ravi Shankar wanted to help in any way he could. He planned to arrange a concert to collect money for the refugees. He approached his dear friend George to help him raise money for this cause. This humanitarian concern from Ravi Shankar sowed the seed of the concept for the Concert for Bangla Desh. With the help of George Harrison, this concert became the first magnus effort in fund raising, paving the way for many others to do charity concerts.
His recording "Tana Mana", released on the private Music label in 1987, brought Mr. Shankar's music into the "New age" with its unique method of combining traditional instruments with electronics.
The love and respect he commands both in India and in the West is unique in the annals of the history of music. In 1989, this remarkable musician celebrated his 50th year of concertising, and the city of Birmingham Touring Opera Company commissioned him to do a Music Theatre (Ghanashyam - a broken branch) which created history on the British arts scene.
Mr. Shankar has several disciples, many of which are now very succesful concert artists and composers.
Perhaps no greater tribute can be paid to this genius than the words of his colleagues:
"Ravi Shankar has brought me a precious gift and through him I have added a new dimension to my experience of music. To me, his genius and his humanity can only be compared to that of Mozart's."
- Yehudi Menuhin
"Ravi Shankar is the Godfather of World Music"
- George Harrison
Always ahead of his time, Ravi Shankar has written three concertos for sitar and orchestra, last one of which in 2008. He has also authored violin-sitar compositions for Yehudi Menuhin and himself, music for flute virtuoso Jean Pierre Rampal, music for Hosan Yamamoto, master of the Shakuhachi and Musumi Miyashita - Koto virtuoso, and has collaborated with Phillip Glass (Passages).
George Harrison produced and participated in two record albums, "Shankar Family & Friends" and "Festival of India" both composed by Ravi Shankar. Ravi Shankar has also composed for ballets and films in India, Canada, Europe and the United States. The latter of which includes the films "Charly," "Gandhi," and the "Apu Trilogy".
In the period of the awakening of the younger generation in the mid 60's, Ravi Shankar gave three memorable concerts - Monterey Pop Festival, Concert for Bangla Desh, and The Woodstock Festival.
Ravi Shankar is an honourary member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters and is a member of the United Nations International Rostrum of composers. He has received many awards and honours from his own country and from all over the world, including fourteen doctorates, the Bharat Ratna, the Padma Vibhushan, Desikottam,Padma Bhushan of 1967, the Music Council UNESCO award 1975, the Magsaysay Award from Manila, two Grammy's, the Fukuoka grand Prize from Japan, the Polar Music Prize of 1998, the Crystal award from Davos, with the title 'Global Ambassador' to name some.
In 1986 Ravi Shankar was nominated as a member of the Rajya Sabha, India's upper house of Parliament.
Deeply moved by the plight of more than eight million refugees who came to India during the Bangla Desh Freedom struggle from Pakistan, Ravi Shankar wanted to help in any way he could. He planned to arrange a concert to collect money for the refugees. He approached his dear friend George to help him raise money for this cause. This humanitarian concern from Ravi Shankar sowed the seed of the concept for the Concert for Bangla Desh. With the help of George Harrison, this concert became the first magnus effort in fund raising, paving the way for many others to do charity concerts.
His recording "Tana Mana", released on the private Music label in 1987, brought Mr. Shankar's music into the "New age" with its unique method of combining traditional instruments with electronics.
The love and respect he commands both in India and in the West is unique in the annals of the history of music. In 1989, this remarkable musician celebrated his 50th year of concertising, and the city of Birmingham Touring Opera Company commissioned him to do a Music Theatre (Ghanashyam - a broken branch) which created history on the British arts scene.
Mr. Shankar has several disciples, many of which are now very succesful concert artists and composers.
Perhaps no greater tribute can be paid to this genius than the words of his colleagues:
"Ravi Shankar has brought me a precious gift and through him I have added a new dimension to my experience of music. To me, his genius and his humanity can only be compared to that of Mozart's."
- Yehudi Menuhin
"Ravi Shankar is the Godfather of World Music"
- George Harrison
2011 - Peter Brook, UK
Peter Stephen Paul Brook was born in London on 21 March 1925 and was educated at Oxford. World famous for his pioneering work in the theatre, in a spectacular career that encompassed more than half of the 20th century, Brook has also directed some significant films in Britain and France. He made his debut in the British cinema with an adaptation of John Gay's satirical The Beggars Opera (1953), with Laurence Olivier as the highwayman MacHeath. Brook's next British film, Lord of the Flies (1963), was an adaptation of William Golding's classic literary parable on the descent of society. The film, done very much au naturelle, with not only amateur actors but also amateur cinematographers, deals with a group of public school children stranded on a deserted tropical island. Their initial struggle for survival soon turns into a desperate and deadly power struggle between two groups, one humanist and civilised, the other savage and militarist. Although the film had a limited impact when first released, it has gradually achieved some cult status for its striking naturalism, its skilful editing, and its sensitive cinematic interpretation of Golding's novel.
Two of Brook's most famous theatrical productions for the Royal Shakespeare Company in the '60s, The Marat-Sade by German modernist Peter Weiss and Shakespeare's King Lear, eventually made it into films with very much the same casts as on stage. Of these, King Lear (1970) is arguably Brook's finest accomplishment within the British cinema. His theatre production had been influenced by the epic theatre of Bertolt Brecht and the dark political vision of Polish Shakespeare scholar Jan Kott. These were now complemented with the art-cinema techniques of the French nouvelle vague, hence the discontinuities of editing, the unconventional camera angles, the grainy black-and-white cinematography and the barren landscape of North Jutland in Denmark where the film was shot. Many critics at the time found the film bleak, but it can now be seen as a major cinematic achievement: a brilliant investigation into the meta-cinematic, which tests the limits between the theatrical and the cinematic, most famously when Paul Scofield, as the dying Lear, literally falls out of the frame.
Brook also directed two drama documentaries in Britain: Tell me Lies (1968), about British anti-Vietnam War sentiment in the late '60s, and Meetings with Remarkable Men (1979), the story of Gurdjieff, an Asian mystic. Since the completion of the latter film in 1979, Brook has continued his filmmaking career in France.
Two of Brook's most famous theatrical productions for the Royal Shakespeare Company in the '60s, The Marat-Sade by German modernist Peter Weiss and Shakespeare's King Lear, eventually made it into films with very much the same casts as on stage. Of these, King Lear (1970) is arguably Brook's finest accomplishment within the British cinema. His theatre production had been influenced by the epic theatre of Bertolt Brecht and the dark political vision of Polish Shakespeare scholar Jan Kott. These were now complemented with the art-cinema techniques of the French nouvelle vague, hence the discontinuities of editing, the unconventional camera angles, the grainy black-and-white cinematography and the barren landscape of North Jutland in Denmark where the film was shot. Many critics at the time found the film bleak, but it can now be seen as a major cinematic achievement: a brilliant investigation into the meta-cinematic, which tests the limits between the theatrical and the cinematic, most famously when Paul Scofield, as the dying Lear, literally falls out of the frame.
Brook also directed two drama documentaries in Britain: Tell me Lies (1968), about British anti-Vietnam War sentiment in the late '60s, and Meetings with Remarkable Men (1979), the story of Gurdjieff, an Asian mystic. Since the completion of the latter film in 1979, Brook has continued his filmmaking career in France.
2012 - Vida Ognjenovic, Serbia
VIDA OGNJENOVIĆ, writer, playwright, theater director, was born in Dubočke, Nikšić ( former Yugoslavia). After the elementary school in Vrbas and secondary school in Sremski Karlovci, she graduated from the University of Belgrade (Dept. of Literature and Languages) (1963) and from the Academy of Theater, Film and Television (1965)
She enrolled in post-graduate studies at Sorbonne in Paris and earned her M.F.A. degree in directing at the Unirvesity of Minnesota, U.S.A. (1972). From 1974 until 1979 she was Assistant Professor at the department of Drama of the University of Arts in Belgrade. In 1977 she was artistic director of the National Theater in Belgrade and when her four-year term expired, she stayed on as director in residence, playwright and acting General Manager ( 1990 - 1993 ) Theatre. She taught and lectured as a visiting profesor and lecturer at several major US universities ( UCLA, UIC, BERCLEY, STANFORD, 1982, 1985, 1991, 1997, 1998, 2001).
Vida Ognjenović has directed close to one hundred theatre plays and many television and radio production. Her theatre work includes productions for a number of theatres in Yugoslavia as well as abroad. She has directed diverse plays, but almost invariably with a very special touch of her own.
She has also written eight plays all of them frequently produced in different theatres whith a long run.
Vida Ognjenović has won all the important theatre awards: October Prize of the City of Belgrade as the director of Mephisto; Golden Laurel Wreath (MES, Sarajevo) for Mephisto; Golden Turkey (Comedy Festival, Svetozarevo) for the text and direction of Making the Master Laugh; the Award of the Vojvodina Theater Meetings for direction; Grand Prix for radio direction; Sterija Award for Was There the Prince's Dinnera and the theatre adaptation of Root, Trunk, Epilogue by G. Nikoliš; Joakim Vujić Award for Making the Master Laugh. Vuk Endowment Fund Award for Was There the Prince's Dinner; Sterija Drama award for the best play for Was There the Prince's Dinner, Sterija Award for the best oplay for Yegor's Path, Sterija Award for the best directing for Yegor's Path
She has published four books of plays: Melancholy Dramas (SKZ, 1991) and Sombre Comedies (SKZ, 1994) Collected plays I, ( Stubovi Kulture, 2000) and Collected plays II. She also has published four books of fiction: The Poisonous Milk of the Dandelion (stories, Prosveta 1994), The House of Dead Scents (novel, Prosveta 1995) and The Grandfather's Clock (stories, Prosveta 1996), The best stories by Vida Ognjenovic ( Prosveta, Belgrade 2001).
Her books have won numerous important awards, including the Andrić Award (1995), Branko Ćopić Award (1996), Prosveta Award for Book of the Year (1994), Laza Kostić Award for the novel (1996), Karol Szirmay Award for stories (1996), Stefan Mitrov Ljubisha Award ( 1999), Paja Marković Adamov Award for fiction (1997).
Her plays and fiction have been translated into English, German and Hungarian. Vida Ognjenović lives and works in Belgrade.
She enrolled in post-graduate studies at Sorbonne in Paris and earned her M.F.A. degree in directing at the Unirvesity of Minnesota, U.S.A. (1972). From 1974 until 1979 she was Assistant Professor at the department of Drama of the University of Arts in Belgrade. In 1977 she was artistic director of the National Theater in Belgrade and when her four-year term expired, she stayed on as director in residence, playwright and acting General Manager ( 1990 - 1993 ) Theatre. She taught and lectured as a visiting profesor and lecturer at several major US universities ( UCLA, UIC, BERCLEY, STANFORD, 1982, 1985, 1991, 1997, 1998, 2001).
Vida Ognjenović has directed close to one hundred theatre plays and many television and radio production. Her theatre work includes productions for a number of theatres in Yugoslavia as well as abroad. She has directed diverse plays, but almost invariably with a very special touch of her own.
She has also written eight plays all of them frequently produced in different theatres whith a long run.
Vida Ognjenović has won all the important theatre awards: October Prize of the City of Belgrade as the director of Mephisto; Golden Laurel Wreath (MES, Sarajevo) for Mephisto; Golden Turkey (Comedy Festival, Svetozarevo) for the text and direction of Making the Master Laugh; the Award of the Vojvodina Theater Meetings for direction; Grand Prix for radio direction; Sterija Award for Was There the Prince's Dinnera and the theatre adaptation of Root, Trunk, Epilogue by G. Nikoliš; Joakim Vujić Award for Making the Master Laugh. Vuk Endowment Fund Award for Was There the Prince's Dinner; Sterija Drama award for the best play for Was There the Prince's Dinner, Sterija Award for the best oplay for Yegor's Path, Sterija Award for the best directing for Yegor's Path
She has published four books of plays: Melancholy Dramas (SKZ, 1991) and Sombre Comedies (SKZ, 1994) Collected plays I, ( Stubovi Kulture, 2000) and Collected plays II. She also has published four books of fiction: The Poisonous Milk of the Dandelion (stories, Prosveta 1994), The House of Dead Scents (novel, Prosveta 1995) and The Grandfather's Clock (stories, Prosveta 1996), The best stories by Vida Ognjenovic ( Prosveta, Belgrade 2001).
Her books have won numerous important awards, including the Andrić Award (1995), Branko Ćopić Award (1996), Prosveta Award for Book of the Year (1994), Laza Kostić Award for the novel (1996), Karol Szirmay Award for stories (1996), Stefan Mitrov Ljubisha Award ( 1999), Paja Marković Adamov Award for fiction (1997).
Her plays and fiction have been translated into English, German and Hungarian. Vida Ognjenović lives and works in Belgrade.
2013 - Herta Müller, Germany
Herta Mueller was born in 1953 in Nitzkydorf in Banat. Her family belonged to the German minority in Romania. From 1973 to 1976, she studied German and Romanian Philology at the West University in Timișoara. After completing her studies, she worked as a translator at a machine factory as well as a teacher until she was dismissed in 1979, because she refused to cooperate with the Romanian secret service, Securitate. She was the only woman in the »Adam Müller-Guttenbrunn« literary circle, which included Romanian-German authors who had been members of the so-called “Aktionsgruppe Banat”, which had been disbanded by Securitate.
Her first volume of stories »Niederungen« (Eng. Nadirs) presents the village life of the Swabians living in Banat in haunting scenes that oscillate between fear, hopelessness, corruption, misery and violence. The volume was only released in Romania in 1982 after radical interventions by the censors. In 1984, the stories were also published in Germany in revised form. Because of the criticism of Ceaușescu’s totalitarian regime she expressed in interviews, she was given a publication and travel ban in her home country, harassed by the secret service and subject to death threats. In 1987, she was finally able to travel to West Berlin. She dealt with her experiences of living in exile, being uprooted from her home and her loneliness in »Reisende auf einem Bein« (1989; Eng. Travelling on One Leg) among others. In addition to novels like »Herztier« (1994; Eng. The Land of Green Plums) and »Heute wär ich mir lieber nicht begegnet« (1997; Eng. The Appointment), she has also written many essays , some of which have been published in collections like »Der König verneigt sich und tötet« (2003; tr. The King Bows and Kills) and »Immer derselbe Schnee und immer derselbe Onkel« (2011; tr. Always the Same Snow and the Same Uncle). In addition, she has completed several albums with lyrical collages made up of words and syllables cut out of newspapers and books. In 2009, her novel »Atemschaukel« (Eng. The Hunger Angel), was released, based on discussions with poet Oskar Pastior about his deportation to a Soviet work camp. The text is marked by Mueller's powerfully eloquent style of presenting individual words and metaphors in extremely compact form. Most recently, she published her new volume of poetic collages »Vater telefoniert mit den Fliegen« (2012; tr. Father is Telephoning with the Flies).
In 2009, Herta Mueller was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature. »The subject of dictatorship is necessarily present, because nothing can ever again be a matter of course once we have been robbed of nearly all ability to take anything for granted.«, she said in her Stockholm Address and told how she took up writing in a degrading and perfidious system: »What was happening could no longer be expressed in speech. [...] That I could only spell out in my head, voicelessly, within the vicious circle of the words during the act of writing.« She was also awarded the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award (1998), the Berlin Literature Prize (2005) and the Order of Merit of the federal Republic of Germany (2010). In 2010, the exhibition »Der kalte Schmuck des Lebens« (tr. The cold jewels of life) designed by Ernest Wichner was dedicated to her. Herta Mueller lives in Berlin.
Her first volume of stories »Niederungen« (Eng. Nadirs) presents the village life of the Swabians living in Banat in haunting scenes that oscillate between fear, hopelessness, corruption, misery and violence. The volume was only released in Romania in 1982 after radical interventions by the censors. In 1984, the stories were also published in Germany in revised form. Because of the criticism of Ceaușescu’s totalitarian regime she expressed in interviews, she was given a publication and travel ban in her home country, harassed by the secret service and subject to death threats. In 1987, she was finally able to travel to West Berlin. She dealt with her experiences of living in exile, being uprooted from her home and her loneliness in »Reisende auf einem Bein« (1989; Eng. Travelling on One Leg) among others. In addition to novels like »Herztier« (1994; Eng. The Land of Green Plums) and »Heute wär ich mir lieber nicht begegnet« (1997; Eng. The Appointment), she has also written many essays , some of which have been published in collections like »Der König verneigt sich und tötet« (2003; tr. The King Bows and Kills) and »Immer derselbe Schnee und immer derselbe Onkel« (2011; tr. Always the Same Snow and the Same Uncle). In addition, she has completed several albums with lyrical collages made up of words and syllables cut out of newspapers and books. In 2009, her novel »Atemschaukel« (Eng. The Hunger Angel), was released, based on discussions with poet Oskar Pastior about his deportation to a Soviet work camp. The text is marked by Mueller's powerfully eloquent style of presenting individual words and metaphors in extremely compact form. Most recently, she published her new volume of poetic collages »Vater telefoniert mit den Fliegen« (2012; tr. Father is Telephoning with the Flies).
In 2009, Herta Mueller was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature. »The subject of dictatorship is necessarily present, because nothing can ever again be a matter of course once we have been robbed of nearly all ability to take anything for granted.«, she said in her Stockholm Address and told how she took up writing in a degrading and perfidious system: »What was happening could no longer be expressed in speech. [...] That I could only spell out in my head, voicelessly, within the vicious circle of the words during the act of writing.« She was also awarded the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award (1998), the Berlin Literature Prize (2005) and the Order of Merit of the federal Republic of Germany (2010). In 2010, the exhibition »Der kalte Schmuck des Lebens« (tr. The cold jewels of life) designed by Ernest Wichner was dedicated to her. Herta Mueller lives in Berlin.
2014 - Svetlin Roussev, Bulgaria
1933 – was born in Pleven, Bulgaria
1959 – graduated from the Academy of Arts, Sofia, with a major in painting under Prof. Dechko Ouzounov Since 1961 has taken part in all general art exhibitions in Bulgaria Lived in Pleven until 1967 (with a short break from 1961 to 1962 spent in Rousse). Since 1967 has been living and working Sofia.
1975 – appointed to a professorship at the National Academy of Arts in Sofia and has been holding the position ever since.
From 1973 to 1985 served as chairman of the Bulgarian Union of Artists, and from 1985 and 1988, as director of the National Art Gallery in Sofia.
In 1984 donated a large collection of modern and classical Bulgarian art, Asian and African art to his native town of Pleven and made it accessible to the public by arranging the collection for a permanent display.
Svetlin Roussev’s art has been acknowledged with numerous awards.
The key distinctions given to him in Bulgaria include: Gold Medal and First Prize from the First Youth Exhibition, 1961; Zahari Zograf Prize for Painting, 1973; The International Painting Triennial Prize, Sofia, 1974; Grand Prix of the Bulgarian Union of Artists, 1986; Vladimir Dimitrov-The Master Award, 1987.
Svetlin Roussev has been awarded with the Paisii Hilendarski National Prize for Arts and Culture, and with Bulgaria’s highest distinction, Stara Planina Order. In 2013 was given the Marin Drinov Award of the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences. He is Doctor Emeritus of the National Academy of Art in Sofia and of the University of Shumen.
Svetlin Roussev has been awarded internationally with distinctions including: Diploma for National Participation at Cagnes-sur-Mer, 1970; Peter & Irene Ludwig Award; Portrait Award, Radom, Poland; Gabriele Olivier Award, Monaco; Golden Laurel from Kuenstlerhaus, Vienna; Grand Prix of the Taylor Foundation, Paris and others.
Mr. Roussev is member of some of the world most prestigious associations of artists, among them Salon d'Automne, Paris, the Russian Academy of Arts, the Medici Academy, the Nikakai Society, Tokyo, and the Royal Flemish Academy of Belgium for Science and the Arts. He is a Corresponding Member of the Kuenstlerhaus in Vienna.
The artist has taken part in many group exhibitions and presentations of Bulgarian art in Paris, Moscow, Saint Petersburg, Budapest, Warsaw, Prague, Bucharest, Vienna, Belgrade, Ankara, Stockholm, Berlin, Munich, Essen, Hamburg, Mexico, Montreal and many other cities all over the world. Roussev has held many solo-exhibitions in Bulgarian towns and cities: Sofia, Burgas, Pleven, Varna, Sliven, Rousse, Balchik and others. Major cities of Europe and USA have hosted his displays as well, such as Moscow, Paris, Mexico, Vienna, Warsaw, Bucharest, Hamburg, Miami, Ferrara, Orvieto and many others.
Mr. Roussev's works are owned by the National Art Gallery, Sofia, the Sofia City Art Gallery and by all regional galleries in the country; by museums, galleries and private collections in Moscow (The Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts), Paris, London, Stockholm, Munich, Dresden, Frankfurt, Bonn, Berlin, Hamburg, Aachen (Ludwig Collection), Koblenz, Essen, Rome, Warsaw Prague, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Miami, Chicago and Beijing. His works are on display at the Hugo Voeten Art Center, Belgium and in many countries of the world including Sweden, Holland, Italy, Portugal, Greece, Argentina, Cuba, Japan etc.
1959 – graduated from the Academy of Arts, Sofia, with a major in painting under Prof. Dechko Ouzounov Since 1961 has taken part in all general art exhibitions in Bulgaria Lived in Pleven until 1967 (with a short break from 1961 to 1962 spent in Rousse). Since 1967 has been living and working Sofia.
1975 – appointed to a professorship at the National Academy of Arts in Sofia and has been holding the position ever since.
From 1973 to 1985 served as chairman of the Bulgarian Union of Artists, and from 1985 and 1988, as director of the National Art Gallery in Sofia.
In 1984 donated a large collection of modern and classical Bulgarian art, Asian and African art to his native town of Pleven and made it accessible to the public by arranging the collection for a permanent display.
Svetlin Roussev’s art has been acknowledged with numerous awards.
The key distinctions given to him in Bulgaria include: Gold Medal and First Prize from the First Youth Exhibition, 1961; Zahari Zograf Prize for Painting, 1973; The International Painting Triennial Prize, Sofia, 1974; Grand Prix of the Bulgarian Union of Artists, 1986; Vladimir Dimitrov-The Master Award, 1987.
Svetlin Roussev has been awarded with the Paisii Hilendarski National Prize for Arts and Culture, and with Bulgaria’s highest distinction, Stara Planina Order. In 2013 was given the Marin Drinov Award of the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences. He is Doctor Emeritus of the National Academy of Art in Sofia and of the University of Shumen.
Svetlin Roussev has been awarded internationally with distinctions including: Diploma for National Participation at Cagnes-sur-Mer, 1970; Peter & Irene Ludwig Award; Portrait Award, Radom, Poland; Gabriele Olivier Award, Monaco; Golden Laurel from Kuenstlerhaus, Vienna; Grand Prix of the Taylor Foundation, Paris and others.
Mr. Roussev is member of some of the world most prestigious associations of artists, among them Salon d'Automne, Paris, the Russian Academy of Arts, the Medici Academy, the Nikakai Society, Tokyo, and the Royal Flemish Academy of Belgium for Science and the Arts. He is a Corresponding Member of the Kuenstlerhaus in Vienna.
The artist has taken part in many group exhibitions and presentations of Bulgarian art in Paris, Moscow, Saint Petersburg, Budapest, Warsaw, Prague, Bucharest, Vienna, Belgrade, Ankara, Stockholm, Berlin, Munich, Essen, Hamburg, Mexico, Montreal and many other cities all over the world. Roussev has held many solo-exhibitions in Bulgarian towns and cities: Sofia, Burgas, Pleven, Varna, Sliven, Rousse, Balchik and others. Major cities of Europe and USA have hosted his displays as well, such as Moscow, Paris, Mexico, Vienna, Warsaw, Bucharest, Hamburg, Miami, Ferrara, Orvieto and many others.
Mr. Roussev's works are owned by the National Art Gallery, Sofia, the Sofia City Art Gallery and by all regional galleries in the country; by museums, galleries and private collections in Moscow (The Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts), Paris, London, Stockholm, Munich, Dresden, Frankfurt, Bonn, Berlin, Hamburg, Aachen (Ludwig Collection), Koblenz, Essen, Rome, Warsaw Prague, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Miami, Chicago and Beijing. His works are on display at the Hugo Voeten Art Center, Belgium and in many countries of the world including Sweden, Holland, Italy, Portugal, Greece, Argentina, Cuba, Japan etc.
2015 - John Ralston Saul, Canada
John Ralston Saul is an award-winning essayist and novelist. A long-time champion of freedom of expression, he was elected President of PEN International in October 2009.
Saul has had a growing impact on political and economic thought in many countries. Declared a “prophet” by TIME magazine, he is included in the prestigious Utne Reader’s list of the world’s 100 leading thinkers and visionaries. His 14 works have been translated into 25 languages in 36 countries. Saul’s most recent essay is The Comeback published in October, 2014.
Saul is perhaps best known for his philosophical trilogy – Voltaire’s Bastards: The Dictatorship of Reason in the West, The Doubter’s Companion: A Dictionary of Aggressive Common Sense and The Unconscious Civilization. This was followed by a meditation on the trilogy – On Equilibrium: Six Qualities of the New Humanism.
He is General Editor of the Penguin Extraordinary Canadians project, a series of 18 biographies that reinterprets important Canadian figures for a contemporary audience by pairing well-known Canadian writers with significant historical, political and artistic figures from 1850 onwards. His most recent work of non-fiction, a biography of Louis-Hippolyte LaFontaine and Robert Baldwin, is his own contribution to this series.
In 2005 in The Collapse of Globalism and the Reinvention of the World, Saul warned that, like it or not, globalism was already collapsing and that if we did not act quickly we would be caught in a crisis and limited to emergency reactions. The Collapse of Globalism was re-issued in 2009 with an updated epilogue that addresses the current crisis.
In his 2008 national bestseller, A Fair Country: Telling Truths about Canada, Saul argued that Canada is a métis nation, heavily influenced and shaped by aboriginal ideas: egalitarianism, a proper balance between individual and groups, and a penchant for negotiation over violence are all aboriginal values that Canada absorbed.
He has received many national and international awards for his writing, including: the Pablo Neruda Medal, South Korea’s Manhae Grand Prize for Literature and The Gutenberg Galaxy Award for Literature. The Unconscious Civilization won Canada’s Governor General’s Literary Award for Non-Fiction, as well as the Gordon Montador Award for Best Canadian Book on Social Issues. His Reflections of a Siamese Twin was chosen by Maclean’s magazine as one of the ten best non-fiction books of the twentieth century. His novel, The Paradise Eater, won Italy’s Premio Lettarario Internazionale.
He has published six novels, including The Birds of Prey, as well as The Field Trilogy, which deals with the crisis of modern power and its clash with the individual. It includes Baraka or The Lives, Fortunes and Sacred Honor of Anthony Smith, The Next Best Thing, and The Paradise Eater. His most recent work of fiction – the first in over fifteen years – is Dark Diversions, a picaresque novel in which he observes the life of modern nouveaux riches Americans.
President of Canadian PEN from 1990-1992 and an active member of Centre québécois du PEN international, he helped create the Canadian PEN Writers In Exile Network in 2004. He is a member of the Norway based Council of Writers and Experts of ICORN (International Cities of Refuge Network).
Saul is the Co-Chair of the Institute for Canadian Citizenship (ICC), a national charity promoting the inclusion of new citizens. He founded the ICC’s LaFontaine-Baldwin Symposium, a national lecture event that showcases leading Canadian and international thinkers and invites Canadians to join the national conversation on citizenship and the public good. He is also Founder and Honorary Chair of Le français pour l’avenir/French for the Future, an organization which advances the use of French among secondary school students, the patron of PLAN, a cutting edge organization serving people with disabilities.
He is a Companion of the Order of Canada and a Chevalier in the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres of France. His 17 honourary degrees range from McGill University and l’Université du Québec (UQAM), both in Montréal, to Herzen State Pedagogical University in St. Petersburg, Russia.
Born in Ottawa, Saul studied at McGill University and King’s College, University of London, where he obtained his Ph.D. in 1972.
2016 - Darko Gašparović, Croatia
The Ohrid Academy of Humanism's the World Prize of Humanism for 2016
Humanism has perhaps never before gone through more difficult times. Placed at the centre of Jesus’ teachings like a being created in the image of God, present since the Antiquity, the age of Hellenism, the dawn of European culture and civilization, raised to the level of a universal paradigm during the Medieval period, humanism as dedication to the human being has over the past two centuries found itself facing the hardships of being challenged both within the social paradigm and within the domain of art. We are permanently facing a basic question: who and what is a man? The image of man as a dual being that embodies and propagates both creation and destruction, both the idea of good, truth and beauty and that of evil, lie and ugliness, a being that is at the same time characterised by the most sublime spirituality and the most base animality – is constantly before our eyes in its most dramatic manifestation. By denying humanism, by proclaiming it, implicitly rather than explicitly, an idea from the storage-room of ancient history, by choosing existence over essence, the man has renounced the very essence of his immortal being. The consequences of this are obvious in all aspects of social life, and most disastrously in politics which are to blame for the present severe universal humanitarian crisis in the world.
Contrary to this, organisations such as the Ohrid Academy of Humanism firmly and continuously represent and promote the idea of humanism as an ineluctable world value that is of the utmost importance for the life and survival of humans and their world. Founded twenty-one years ago, in one of the oldest towns in the world, in Macedonia, which is also the ancient centre of Slavic culture and civilisation, this Academy inherits the original idea of the Hellenic Academy as the key place that promotes the totality of knowledge and art. The creation of the World Prize of Humanism, which has up until now been awarded to nine great figures from various fields of philosophy and art, is in line with this heritage. The recipients of this award include primarily people who are representatives of great nations: Japanese Buddhist philosopher Daisaky Ikeda, Portuguese director Manuel De Oliveira, Russian author and Nobel Prize winner Aleksandar Solženjicin, Indian sitar player and composer Ravi Shankar, British theatre and film director Peter Brook, German writer and Nobel Prize winner Herta Miler, Canadian writer and the president of the PEN organisation John Ralston Saul. But, two people, who belong to nations in south-eastern Europe that on the global scale would be considered small, have also received this prize: Serbian writer, playwright and theatre director Vida Ognjenović and Bulgarian painter Svetlin Rusev. I am deeply honoured that the seven-member committee headed by the ambassador, the president of the Ohrid Academy of Humanism, the advisor to the president of the Republic of Macedonia and the chancellor of the University of Audiovisual Arts in Skopje, Mr. Jordan Plevneš has chosen me to be the recipient of the World Prize of Humanism for the year 2016, and thus placed me in the company of such illustrious thinkers and artists. My pleasure is augmented by the fact that in 2016 Macedonia, other Slavic countries and the rest of the world are marking one thousandth anniversary of the death of St. Clement of Ohrid, the disciple of the brother saints Cyril and Methodius, a co-patrons of Europe and the founder of the first European University. I am a member of a Croatian nation, a nation that is not great in number and that has lived on a relatively small territory since the 7th century, but a nation that has throughout history, despite the fact that it has never been numerous, produced many world-renowned humanists: Marko Marulić, „the father of Croatian literature“ and a world-renowned Renaissance Latinist writer; Marin Držić, the great comediographer; Ruđer Bošković, the world-renowned Baroque scientist; Juraj Križanić, the founder of the idea of Panslavism and ecumenical unity of Catholics and Orthodox Christians; and, more recently, Nikola Tesla (who said that he was proud of his Serbian origin and his Croatian homeland) and Miroslav Krleža, the great writer and encyclopaedist.
Allow me to end with the verses from the poem Pobratimstvo lica u svemiru (The Blood Brotherhood of Persons in Universe) by the greatest Croatian poet of the 20th century, Tin Ujević, which perfectly reflect the idea of universal brotherhood:
Sa svakim nešto dijeliš, i više vas ste isti.
I pamti da je tako od prastarih vremena.
I svi se ponavljamo, i veliki i čisti,
Kao djeca što ne znaju još ni svojih imena.
(You share something with everyone, several of you are the same.
And remember that it has been that way since the ancient times.
We all repeat, the great and the pure,
Like children who know not yet their names.)
Humanism has perhaps never before gone through more difficult times. Placed at the centre of Jesus’ teachings like a being created in the image of God, present since the Antiquity, the age of Hellenism, the dawn of European culture and civilization, raised to the level of a universal paradigm during the Medieval period, humanism as dedication to the human being has over the past two centuries found itself facing the hardships of being challenged both within the social paradigm and within the domain of art. We are permanently facing a basic question: who and what is a man? The image of man as a dual being that embodies and propagates both creation and destruction, both the idea of good, truth and beauty and that of evil, lie and ugliness, a being that is at the same time characterised by the most sublime spirituality and the most base animality – is constantly before our eyes in its most dramatic manifestation. By denying humanism, by proclaiming it, implicitly rather than explicitly, an idea from the storage-room of ancient history, by choosing existence over essence, the man has renounced the very essence of his immortal being. The consequences of this are obvious in all aspects of social life, and most disastrously in politics which are to blame for the present severe universal humanitarian crisis in the world.
Contrary to this, organisations such as the Ohrid Academy of Humanism firmly and continuously represent and promote the idea of humanism as an ineluctable world value that is of the utmost importance for the life and survival of humans and their world. Founded twenty-one years ago, in one of the oldest towns in the world, in Macedonia, which is also the ancient centre of Slavic culture and civilisation, this Academy inherits the original idea of the Hellenic Academy as the key place that promotes the totality of knowledge and art. The creation of the World Prize of Humanism, which has up until now been awarded to nine great figures from various fields of philosophy and art, is in line with this heritage. The recipients of this award include primarily people who are representatives of great nations: Japanese Buddhist philosopher Daisaky Ikeda, Portuguese director Manuel De Oliveira, Russian author and Nobel Prize winner Aleksandar Solženjicin, Indian sitar player and composer Ravi Shankar, British theatre and film director Peter Brook, German writer and Nobel Prize winner Herta Miler, Canadian writer and the president of the PEN organisation John Ralston Saul. But, two people, who belong to nations in south-eastern Europe that on the global scale would be considered small, have also received this prize: Serbian writer, playwright and theatre director Vida Ognjenović and Bulgarian painter Svetlin Rusev. I am deeply honoured that the seven-member committee headed by the ambassador, the president of the Ohrid Academy of Humanism, the advisor to the president of the Republic of Macedonia and the chancellor of the University of Audiovisual Arts in Skopje, Mr. Jordan Plevneš has chosen me to be the recipient of the World Prize of Humanism for the year 2016, and thus placed me in the company of such illustrious thinkers and artists. My pleasure is augmented by the fact that in 2016 Macedonia, other Slavic countries and the rest of the world are marking one thousandth anniversary of the death of St. Clement of Ohrid, the disciple of the brother saints Cyril and Methodius, a co-patrons of Europe and the founder of the first European University. I am a member of a Croatian nation, a nation that is not great in number and that has lived on a relatively small territory since the 7th century, but a nation that has throughout history, despite the fact that it has never been numerous, produced many world-renowned humanists: Marko Marulić, „the father of Croatian literature“ and a world-renowned Renaissance Latinist writer; Marin Držić, the great comediographer; Ruđer Bošković, the world-renowned Baroque scientist; Juraj Križanić, the founder of the idea of Panslavism and ecumenical unity of Catholics and Orthodox Christians; and, more recently, Nikola Tesla (who said that he was proud of his Serbian origin and his Croatian homeland) and Miroslav Krleža, the great writer and encyclopaedist.
Allow me to end with the verses from the poem Pobratimstvo lica u svemiru (The Blood Brotherhood of Persons in Universe) by the greatest Croatian poet of the 20th century, Tin Ujević, which perfectly reflect the idea of universal brotherhood:
Sa svakim nešto dijeliš, i više vas ste isti.
I pamti da je tako od prastarih vremena.
I svi se ponavljamo, i veliki i čisti,
Kao djeca što ne znaju još ni svojih imena.
(You share something with everyone, several of you are the same.
And remember that it has been that way since the ancient times.
We all repeat, the great and the pure,
Like children who know not yet their names.)
2017 - Jiri Svoboda, Czech Republic
"I feel very honored to receive this year’s award from The Ohrid Academy of humanism whose winners from previous years are significant figures before whom I bow. There is little symbolism because I was born on May 5, 1945, four days before signing the capitulation of Nazi Germany and the end of a senseless war that took many human lives and material sacrifices. One of them was my grandfather, tortured in Nazi prison, a year earlier, before I was born. He was extremely intellectually gifted man in pre-war Czechoslovakia, he presided over the Buddhist community, wrote five books about Buddhism and its relationship to Christianity, and he had close friendship with the abbot of a Buddhist monastery in Ceylon, I keep his letters in the archives. It seems like in his fate the two directions of the development of humanity in the twentieth century clashed - faith in the spiritual and moral values on the one hand, and the unstoppable brutal violence on the other side. From the great library of my parents during my adolescence I drew exceptional aesthetic and humanistic messages, I loved the novels of Tolstoy or Dostoyevsky, with their characters torn between good and evil, and before all of them, the chastity of Aljosha, from the Brothers Karamazov, which in our world of unstable values is badly needed.
New technology has simplified life, but in the same time it distracted us from the enlightened message, represented by people like Rousseau and Kant. The infinite depths the Internet replaced deep thoughts, and Christian church was replaced by the temples of consumerism. Instead of Stendhal and Exupéry, we’re exposed to television series, filled with sex and violence. But maybe that's just my feeling of nostalgic old man. From the moment when I graduated from the Prague Film Academy and got a chance to shoot my first film, I tried to express my own point of view about good and to evil, which is dormant in the roots of man, and which from time to time we forget; we forget the impressive human greatness, described in the works of Plato and Aristotle, the tympanum of the Hellenic temples created by Phidias, and again it turns into rude animal, insensitive to the sufferings of the fellow human beings.
Last year in the festival "Bogorodicen pokrov" in Skopje, introduced my film about the great Czech philosopher Jan Hus; this film is about the greater goodness, courage and faith in ourselves, true values vs. the desire for power, mistrust of anything pretending to have a genuine moral and spiritual dimension.
I would like to believe that future belongs to the people loyal to their worldview, people who continue to work, building on the values of the Hellenistic culture, renaissance and enlightenment. But that is perhaps too optimistic. Once again thank you for the honor, which gives meaning to the message of humanism, and I see it as an obligation to the future."
Jiri Svoboda, Ohrid 2017
New technology has simplified life, but in the same time it distracted us from the enlightened message, represented by people like Rousseau and Kant. The infinite depths the Internet replaced deep thoughts, and Christian church was replaced by the temples of consumerism. Instead of Stendhal and Exupéry, we’re exposed to television series, filled with sex and violence. But maybe that's just my feeling of nostalgic old man. From the moment when I graduated from the Prague Film Academy and got a chance to shoot my first film, I tried to express my own point of view about good and to evil, which is dormant in the roots of man, and which from time to time we forget; we forget the impressive human greatness, described in the works of Plato and Aristotle, the tympanum of the Hellenic temples created by Phidias, and again it turns into rude animal, insensitive to the sufferings of the fellow human beings.
Last year in the festival "Bogorodicen pokrov" in Skopje, introduced my film about the great Czech philosopher Jan Hus; this film is about the greater goodness, courage and faith in ourselves, true values vs. the desire for power, mistrust of anything pretending to have a genuine moral and spiritual dimension.
I would like to believe that future belongs to the people loyal to their worldview, people who continue to work, building on the values of the Hellenistic culture, renaissance and enlightenment. But that is perhaps too optimistic. Once again thank you for the honor, which gives meaning to the message of humanism, and I see it as an obligation to the future."
Jiri Svoboda, Ohrid 2017
