Luis García Montero receives the XX Blanquerna Award: “Barcelona is part of my family” | Culture | EUROtoday

Applause resounded on the partitions of the Neptuno Palace this Tuesday afternoon, when Luis García Montero went as much as acquire the XX Blanquerna Premi from the president of the Generalitat, Salvador Illa. After eight years with out the competition being held, the poet and director of the Cervantes Institute has been acknowledged for being “a disseminator of Catalan literature, as a poet, critic and teacher, as well as his commitment to all the literature of the State from the direction of the Cervantes Institute,” stated journalist Àngels Barceló – a member of the jury – whereas winking and giving the winner a smile.

García Montero’s phrases of gratitude had been, for essentially the most half, acknowledgments to his Catalan poet buddies, who reside with him, however he can not name on the cellphone, he joked. “Sharing poetic illusions with Catalan friends in Barcelona, ​​Valencia or Mallorca. Barcelona was Àlex Susana, Miquel de Palol or Joan Margarit. It was a form of love of freedom.”

In his phrases he additionally spoke of his admiration for names previous to his profession, reminiscent of Jaime Gil de Biedma, Carlos Barral, Joan Maragall, Salvador Espriu, Mercè Rodoreda, Gabriel Ferrater, Joan Vinyoli or Vicent Andrés Estellés.

Barcelona is his household, he stated, as a result of uncles and nephews reside there, as a result of buddies who emigrated within the sixties and seventies lived there, and since Editorial Tusquets was a basic firm for him and his spouse, the author Almudena Grandes, who additionally died in 2021. For him it has been lucky to “inhabit a diverse Spanish culture, proud of its languages ​​and its literary traditions that dialogue with each other as a sign of identity of democratic illusions.”

The 66-year-old from Granada has starred on the Spanish literary scene in current many years. His profession, which started within the eighties, consists of an intensive checklist of publications, reminiscent of poetry collections Separate roomswith which he received the Loewe and National Poetry Prize in 1994; both The intimacy of the snake which earned him the Critics’ Prize in 2003. He can also be an essayist – his writings embrace The sixth day, The house owners of the void e Barbaric considerations—, and creator of novels reminiscent of Tomorrow is not going to be what God desires, somebody says your title o Don’t inform me your life. But his profession has not been restricted to tradition, but in addition to politics, along with his activism first within the Communist Party after which in Izquierda Unida, the place in 2015 he headed the checklist for the Madrid regional elections.

Precisely, the intervention of the president of the Generalitat handled politics, with a conciliatory tone on the connection between Catalonia and the remainder of Spain, and on the present social crises wherein he listed the warfare in Ukraine and Palestine, discrimination towards migrants and the necessity for reminiscence 50 years after the demise of the dictator Francisco Franco. Illa started his phrases by recognizing García Montero as “one of the most important poets of the Spanish language”, after which requested himself: “What does a poet do with his verses? Search for the deepest truth. Defending the truth is defending democracy”, and quoted the poet’s phrases: “I need not to be unjust from the truth to continue fighting against lies.”

After the respective hugs and photographs displaying the award, the celebration continued with a musical quantity by Paco Ibáñez, who declared himself glad to sing to his good friend. The singer sang and the viewers adopted him with applause in Gallopingwith the textual content by Rafael Alberti, and Once upon a time, concerning the poem by José Agustín Goytisolo. Minutes earlier than, the actor Josep María Pou learn the poem Epistleby García Montero, translated into Catalan.

Also talking on the occasion was the tutorial and director of the Poetry Classroom of the University of Barcelona, ​​Noemí Montetes-Mairal, who proposed the candidacy: “[García Montero] He is a philologist aware that every linguistic conflict is in itself a political conflict and that, to unravel linguistic issues, one must first unravel political ones. This was one of the key hallmarks of his career.” For Montetes-Mairal, the poet symbolizes assembly factors, a want to attempt to enhance relations between each languages.

Beyond the speeches, the friendships, the awards and the songs, to know the poet’s relationship with Catalonia it was sufficient merely to take heed to his poem stroll with you: “He crosses individuals and speaks in a gorgeous language that I discover obscure. And but this metropolis is mine, it belongs to my life like a port to its ships.