Nobel Prize

The Deleted World Poems By Tomas Tranströmer Versions by Robin Robertson Farrar, Straus & Giroux. 64 pp. $13 paperback. Reviewed by John Timpane   Why wouldn't you buy this book? Thirteen bucks. Exactly 15 poems on 37 pages, plus a short introduction. Less than a dollar a poem, people, to be introduced to the latest Nobel Prize in Literature!? Most of the poems are 20, maybe 30 words long. I realize poems scare the lightning out of people, but really, can we be serious?

OSLO, Norway - Three women who fought injustice, dictatorship, and sexual violence in Liberia and Yemen accepted the 2011 Nobel Peace Prize on Saturday, calling on repressed women worldwide to rise up against male supremacy. "My sisters, my daughters, my friends - find your voice," Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf said after collecting her Nobel diploma and medal at a ceremony in Oslo. Sirleaf, Africa's first democratically elected female president, shared the award with women's-rights campaigner Leymah Gbowee, also from Liberia, and Tawakkul Karman, a female icon of the protest movement in Yemen.

H. Gobind Khorana, 89, who rose from a childhood of poverty in India to become a biochemist and share in a Nobel Prize for his role in deciphering the genetic code, died Wednesday in Concord, Mass. His death was announced by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where Mr. Khorana was a professor emeritus. Mr. Khorana, who received his early schooling from his village teacher under a tree, advanced his education through scholarships and fellowships to become an authority on the chemical synthesis of proteins and nucleic acids, the large molecules in cells that carry genetic information.

Norman Ramsey, 96, who shared the 1989 Nobel Prize in physics for his research into atomic energy levels that led to the creation of the atomic clock and MRI machines, died Friday at a nursing home in Wayland, Mass., his wife, Ellie, said Monday. Mr. Ramsey was an emeritus professor of physics at Harvard University. In his autobiography for the Nobel Prize - which he shared with Hans Dehmelt and Wolfgang Paul - he wrote that he was inspired by failure in molecular beam magnetic resonance experiments in the late 1940s to invent a new technique of measuring the frequency of radiation from atoms using two electromagnetic fields.

Herbert A. Hauptman, 94, a mathematician who shared the 1985 Nobel Prize in chemistry with the chemist Jerome Karle for developing revolutionary methods for determining the structure of molecules vital to life, died Sunday in Buffalo. Mr. Hauptman and Karle's work had far-reaching impact in the manufacture of drugs for a variety of ailments. Mr. Hauptman began collaborating with Karle after World War II. They turned their attention to X-ray crystallography, a means of deducing the three-dimensional structure of a molecule by analyzing how a crystal form of the molecule scatters a beam of X-rays aimed at it. The scattering pattern is recorded as points of light on X-ray film.

Herbert Hauptman, 94, who won the Nobel Prize in chemistry in 1985 for his work uncovering the structure of molecules, has died. He had worked into his 90s at the research institute in Buffalo that now bears his name. He recently had a stroke, a colleague said Monday. Mr. Hauptman received the Nobel Prize nearly 40 years after setting out to solve a problem other scientists had given up on: how to determine molecular structures using X-ray crystallography. He used mathematical equations to interpret the patterns formed by X-rays scattered from crystals.

MONROVIA, Liberia - Africa's only female president, who was just awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for helping stabilize this war-torn nation, led in unofficial results released Wednesday. But the early tally indicates she didn't receive the 50 percent needed to avoid a runoff. That means Harvard-educated Ellen Johnson Sirleaf will likely need to face a second round of voting. That will pit her against the party of a popular soccer star who has appealed to voters by portraying Sirleaf as an Ivy Leaguer out of touch with the country's impoverished population.

MONROVIA, Liberia - Even as she basks in praise from abroad after sharing the Nobel Peace Prize, President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf is facing an election at home that she may lose. She's credited with stabilizing Liberia after civil war, but most of the people voting in Tuesday's election have not been able to find a job since she took office nearly six years ago. Voters camped out overnight and formed lines that were dozens of people deep. Their faces were wet from the early morning downpour, yet they patiently waited their turn, huddled in groups of twos and threes under candy-colored umbrellas for a chance to either reelect Sirleaf, or choose from one of the 15 opposition candidates who say they'll do a better job. The Harvard-educated Sirleaf, 72, is credited with attracting donors and helping restructure the country's debt.

OSLO, Norway - Leymah Gbowee confronted armed forces in Liberia to demand that they stop using rape as a weapon. Ellen Johnson Sirleaf became Africa's first woman to win a free presidential election. And Tawakkul Karman began pushing for change in Yemen long before the Arab Spring. They share a commitment to women's rights in regions where oppression is common, and on Friday, they shared the Nobel Peace Prize. The Norwegian Nobel Committee honored women for the first time in seven years, and in selecting Karman, it also recognized the Arab Spring movement championed by millions of often anonymous activists from Tunisia to Syria.