Russian author Alexander Solzhenitsyn will be awarded the prestigious Russian State Prize for work in the humanities, as announced Tuesday by the Kremlin.

The 88-year-old writer received the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1970. He was exiled from the Soviet Union in 1974, due to his revealing writings about the Gulag, the Soviet labor camp system.

The Russian State Prize for work in the humanities will be awarded to Solzhenitsyn next week in accordance with an order signed by President Vladimir Putin, the Kremlin said.

Solzhenitsyn’s most well known works are his Soviet-era classics “One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich” and “The Gulag Archipelago.” It was the latter that led to his 20-year exile.

Solzhenitsyn was not present when the Kremlin made the announcement. His wife Natalya said the writer hoped his study of Russia's history would be of help to the country in the future.

Yury Osipov, president of the Russian Academy of Sciences, called Solzhenitsyn “the author of works without which the history of the 20th century is unthinkable,” as reported by Interfax.

Natalya said the Russian State Prize “gives a certain hope, and Alexander Isayevich (Solzhenitsyn) would be glad if that hope came to life, a hope our country will learn the lesson of its self-destruction in the 20th century and not repeat it,” Interfax reported.

Solzhenitsyn will be the second person to receive the prize for work in the humanities. The first to receive the honor was Russian Orthodox Patriarch Alexiy II, in 2006.