Herta Muller's winning the 2009 Nobel Prize for Literature was hailed by writer Gunter Grass and by the mayor of the village Nitchidorf in Western Romania, where Muller was born, according to the AFP.

Gunter Grass, who received the Nobel for Literature in 1999, said he was impressed and pleased by Muller as she is a very good novelist, despite that his favorite for the Nobel was Amos Oz.

And AFP quotes Ioan Mascovescu, the mayor of Nitchidorf village in Western Romania where Herta Muller, a German writer originating from the German ethnic minority in Romania, was born. According to Mascovescu, due to Muller's prize "Nitchidorf exists on the world map".

He said that while the Nitchidorf building where Muller was born has been nationalised by the Communist regime, the writer has inherited a plot of land there but she hasn't visited the place any more.

The Romanian Foreign Ministry also congratulated Muller in a press release on Thursday as the Nobel Prize is a "deserved public recognition" of her talent and creation.