South Korean author Han Kang has received the Nobel Prize in Literature at an awards ceremony in Sweden, becoming the first South Korean and the first Asian woman to win the honor. 

Han received a diploma and a Nobel medal from Sweden’s King Carl XVI Gustaf during a ceremony on Tuesday afternoon at the Concert Hall in Stockholm.

In a five-minute speech before awarding the prize, Swedish novelist Ellen Mattson said two colors meet in Han’s writing, white for snow and red for blood and pain, symbolizing a historical experience that Han returns to in her novels.

Mattson, a member of the Swedish Academy, said Han speaks of “indescribable cruelty, of irreparable loss,” and ultimately seeks out the truth. 

Han is the 121st recipient of the Nobel Prize in Literature and the 18th woman to receive the honor since the prize’s inception in 1901.

South Korea’s first Nobel laureate was the late President Kim Dae-jung, who won the peace prize in 2000.