Selva Almada, Vicente Battista, and Sergio Bizzio, finalists for the Rómulo Gallegos Award
Three Argentine writers are vying for the twenty-first edition of the Rómulo Gallegos International Novel Prize , one of the top awards in Spanish literature: Selva Almada , Vicente Battista , and Sergio Bizzio are among the nine finalists announced today.
Almada Jungle. (Photo by BENJAMIN CREMEL / AFP)
The Rómulo Gallegos Prize awards $100,000 and a diploma. Almada is competing for his novel No es un río (It's Not a River) ; Battista for El simulacrumo de los espejos (The Simulation of Mirrors ); and Bizzio for Perdidos (Lost ). The other six finalists are authors from Colombia, Spain, Mexico, Peru, and Venezuela.
For this edition, according to the Rómulo Gallegos Latin American Studies Center Foundation (Celarg), 474 works from 32 countries were submitted . "This represents a significant increase compared to the historical maximum of 274 competing works registered in 2009," the institution indicated.
Writer Sergio Bizzio poses for a photo in Buenos Aires, February 9, 2024. Photo: Mariana Nedelcu.
Since 1968, the Rómulo Gallegos International Novel Prize has honored the work of the eminent Venezuelan novelist and encouraged creative activity in the field of Spanish-language narrative.
In addition to the Argentinian novels, the following are also nominated for the award : Background Voices by María Elvira González (Venezuela); Thirst Goes Away with the River by Andrea Mejía (Colombia); The Stranger by Olga Merino (Spain); The Sea You Gift Me by Jorge Rodríguez (Venezuela); How I Saw the Naked Woman as She Entered the Forest by Martín Solares (Mexico); and Huaco Portrait by Gabriela Wiener (Peru).
Vicente Battista. Photo: Juano Tesone.
The previous edition in 2020 was won by Argentine Perla Suez with her work El país del diablo (The Devil's Country), a 19th-century story published in 2015. Suez thus became the second woman to win this award , which was established in 1967, after Mexican Elena Poniatowska won it in 2007 with El tren pasa primero (The Train Passes First) .
Furthermore , it was the fourth time that a work from Argentina won the competition , after Los perros del paraíso, by Abel Posse in 1987, Santo oficio de la memoria , by Mempo Giardinelli in 1993, and Blanco nocturno , by Ricardo Piglia , in 2011.
In this edition of the award, also won in the past by Colombian Gabriel García Márquez and Chilean Roberto Bolaño , five other women joined Suez in the group of ten finalists who stood out among the 214 nominated works.
Clarin
