Following Philip Roth's win last year, today pro-gay hetero Antonio Muñoz Molina has won the Prince of Asturias prize for literature and, as previously announced, out lesbian Annie Leibovitz won the prize in humanities and director Michael Haneke won in arts for his "radical sincerity, keen observation and extreme subtlety." Each winner receives €50,000.
The jury praised Molina for "the depth and brilliance with which he has narrated relevant fragments of his country’s history, crucial episodes of the contemporary world and meaningful aspects of his personal experience. A body of work which admirably reveals his condition as an intellectual with a commitment to his time." He beat seventeen other unnamed finalists from eleven countries.
Four months ago Molina won the Jerusalem Prize. Among his most acclaimed novels are Winter in Lisbon, Sepharad [Kindle], A Manuscript of Ashes [Kindle], In Her Absence [Kindle], and In the Night of Time [Kindle], which last October won the Prix Jean Monnet de littérature européenne.
Antonio Muñoz Molina is married to fellow award-winning writer Elvira Lindo and his official website says, "Un progresista, aunque sea hombre, es feminista; aunque sea heterosexual, defiende con vigor el respeto a la condición y la igualdad jurídica de los homosexuales;" which, you know, you don't see on so many straight male writer's sites in the US or UK.
Comments