About Ágota Kristóf
Ágota Kristóf (Hungarian: Kristóf Ágota; 30 October 1935 – 27 July 2011) was a Hungarian writer who lived in Switzerland and wrote in French. Kristóf received the "European prize" (Prix Europe, a.k.a. Prix Littéraire Europe, Grand Prix Littéraire Européen) from ADELF, the association of Francophone authors, for Le Grand Cahier (1986; later translated into English as The Notebook). It was followed by two sequels which are collectively The Notebook Trilogy. She won the 2001 Gottfried Keller Award in Switzerland and the Austrian State Prize for European Literature in 2008. == Early life == Ágota Kristóf was born in Csikvánd, Hungary on 30 October 1935. Her parents were Kálmán Kristóf, an elementary school teacher and Antónia Turchányi, a professor of arts. At the age of 21 she had to leave her country when the Hungarian anti-communist revolution was suppressed by the Soviet military. She, her husband (who used to be her history teacher at school) and their 4-month-old daughter escaped to Neuchâtel in Switzerland. After five years of loneliness and exile, she quit her work in a factory and left her husband.
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