Your Royal Highnesses,

Professor Kristeva,

Ladies and Gentlemen!

It is a pleasure to host this dinner in celebration of the first award of the Holberg prize. First of all I would like to congratulate professor Julia Kristeva as the very first Holberg laureate. This is indeed an historic occasion - for science in general and the humanities and social sciences in particular.

The Holberg International Memorial Prize is awarded to scholars who have made outstanding contributions to research in the arts and humanities, social science, law and theology, either within one of these fields or through interdisciplinary work.

The Prize is named after the Norwegian/Danish scholar and playwright Ludvig Holberg. He was born in Bergen on December 3 ^rd >(on this very day) in 1684. He moved to Copenhagen as a young student, and held several Chairs as professor at the University of Copenhagen.

Holberg was a pioneer in several areas: He was a master of an impressive variety of academic disciplines, including history, law and what we today call political science. He was concerned with reforming and modernising education; he was a cosmopolitan scholar who travelled extensively in Europe. His curriculum vitae is indeed quite impressive.

If I may add a personal comment; this goes to show that a degree in theology can qualify for a number of career paths, including politics!

Ludvig Holberg, looking back on his impressive career in 1743, confesses: “I owe everything to French books; by reading them at an early age I acquired a taste that many have come to appreciate in my work”.

I would think that professor Kristeva can easily identify both with Holberg’s great interest in French literature and the urge to travel and study abroad as a young scholar. Julia Kristeva arrived in Paris from Bulgaria in 1965 as a 25-year-old doctoral research fellow and was very soon recognized as a remarkable talent.

She has been awarded the Holberg prize for her outstanding academic achievements through decades. Her innovative exploration of questions in the intersection of language, culture and literature has inspired research across the humanities and the social sciences throughout the world. The Board has chosen a worthy winner - a winner who has taken the Holberg tradition of excellence and interdisciplinary work further.

The Government had several reasons for establishing the Holberg Prize:

- Our aim is to strengthen and encourage quality in all areas

of science, including the humanities and social sciences.

- Scientific research of high quality is more often that not the

product of extensive international cooperation. Our second aim is that this

Prize together with the formerly established Abel Prize in mathematics

will contribute to increased international cooperation.

- We also want to strengthen the connection between science and

society in a broad sense, and raise public awareness of the importance of research in the humanities and social sciences. We depend on these fields of science for a better understanding of our modern and complex world, and for international

communication.

- Finally, our aim is, through the Holberg Prize, to stimulate the interest

of young people in science. Whereas some of the academic disciplines

covered by this Prize are blessed with a continued strong interest

among students, other disciplines face challenges in this regard.

We are particularly concerned with the declining interest in some of the

foreign languages. The government has therefore taken measures to

encourage the teaching of a greater variety of foreign languages in

Norwegian schools, and a second foreign language will be made

compulsory in lower secondary school.

For Ludvig Holberg, growing up in Bergen at the end of the 17 ^th> Century, the mastery of foreign languages was part of the daily routine.

The population of Bergen at the time consisted of nearly 50 per cent foreigners, many were involved in international trade, others were craftsmen, sailors, or simply fortune hunters.

In one of his letters Holberg compares Bergen to Noahs Ark, and describes an influx to the town “as if it were to a common fatherland, not only from the surrounding areas, but from far away”.

In order to prosper, such a pluralistic society is dependent on values like tolerance and respect for others. Whereas Holberg spoke warmly about patriotism, he declared that patriotism turns to a flaw as soon as it interferes with “the common duty to love all human beings”.

Holberg – like us – was not unfamiliar with the challenges and opportunities that face pluralistic and multi-ethnic societies, a topic which has also been central to professor Kristevas research.

The Holberg prize is both a tribute to an eminent scientist, and a way of promoting focus on the humanities and social sciences. I believe that both objectives honour the memory of Ludvig Holberg.

Please, join me in a toast to the Holberg Laureate, professor Julia Kristeva!