The Nobel literature prize to be announced on Thursday is likely to go to a Western male author this year, experts predict after South Korea's Han Kang last year became the first Asian woman to win.

Awarding the prize to another woman this year would make history: it has never gone to a woman two years in a row, and women are vastly under-represented among its laureates -- just 18 out of 121 since it was first awarded in 1901.

But literary critics in Stockholm told AFP they therefore expect a Western man to get the nod this year, citing Australia's Gerald Murnane, Romania's Mircea Cartarescu, Hungary's Laszlo Krasznahorkai and Peter Nadas as possibilities, as well as Swiss postmodernist Christian Kracht.

Murnane and Krasznahorkai meanwhile have the lowest odds on betting sites, along wi

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