Mahfouz was the first Arab to ever win the Nobel Prize for literature, while Orhan Pamuk was the first Turkish individual to win a Nobel Prize at all. In contrast to Mahfouz who criticized his nation's government only indirectly, Pamuk's open criticism of Turkish government practices outside of his fictional universe made him something of a cause celeb for human-rights organizations and writers' unions. Rather than praise, right-win Turkish patriots lobbied for punishing him under Article 301 of the Turkish criminal code. Article #01 bans expressions of speech that could be considered critical of the Turkish culture, and carries a penalty of up to three years in prison ("In Istanbul, a writer awaits her day in court," the Guardian, 2006). The feminist Turkish author Elif Shafak suffered a similar fate upon the publication of her novel the Bastard of Istanbul.

In the eyes of some Westerners, the condemnation of both...
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