Mia Couto Wins the 2013 Camões Prize for Literature
Mia Couto |
Miguel of St. Orberose informed me of this. On Monday May 27, Mozambican writer Mia Couto - author of Voices Made Night and Every Man is a Race - was announced as the winner of the 2013 Camões, one of the most prestigious international awards honoring the work of Portuguese language writers in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
The awarding jury included writers Jose Eduardo Agualusa and Joao Paulo Borges Coelho, journalist Jose Carlos Vasconcelos, professor Clara Crabbe Rocha, critic Alcir Pecora and Ambassador and member of the Brazilian Academy of Letters da Costa e Silva.
The Camões Prize was created in 1988, by Portugal and Brazil, to distinguish writers of the Portuguese language whose work has contributed to the enrichment of the literary and cultural heritage of the Portuguese language. (Source)
I was very happy for the announcement. The Camões Prize tends to focus only on Brazilian and Portuguese literature. Of all the living African writers of the Portuguese language, Mia Couto was the greatest one who still hadn't received the prize. So this was an act of justice and a show of good taste.
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