Padura wins National Literary Award

HAVANA, 18 Dec 2012 –Progreso Semanal/Radio Progreso Alternativa (RPA)– Writer, journalist and literary critic Leonardo Padura Fuentes, 57, won the highest prize of Cuban literature, the 2012 National Literary Award. The news was broadcast nationwide during the prime-time newscast on Cuban TV.

The prize is awarded by the Ministry of Culture and the Cuban Book Institute (ICL) on the basis of a jury’s choice. This year, 18 writers were nominated but the nod went to Padura. The jury was composed of Denia Garcia Ronda, Jorge Fornet, Víctor Fowler, Cira Romero, Marilyn Bobes, and Astrid Santana; it was presided by Reynaldo González, who won the 2003 National Award.

Padura is the novelist whose books are most widely sought by Cuban readers. “His novels fly off the shelves or disappear,” bookstore owners say.

Outstanding among his books are the novel “The Novel of my Life,” deemed a must-read for those interested in national culture, “Yesterday’s Fog,” “The Man Who Loved Dogs” (his latest best-seller) and a series of novels based on a character that fascinates Cubans, Mario Conde. The book will be turned into a movie soon by a French producer. At present, Padura is finishing his latest novel “Heretics.”

A lover of baseball and an Industriales fan, Padura lives in the Mantilla barrio. During his literary career, he has won several prizes: UNEAC (1993), Café Gijón (1995), Dashiell Hammett (1998), José A. Fernández de Castro Cultural Journalism (2005), Literary Criticism (2011) and the Roger Callois Award (2011), apropos of which Progreso Semanal interviewed him months ago.

He will be presented with the 2012 National Literature Award during the next Havana International Book Fair in February 2013 at the Nicolás Guillén Hall of La Cabaña Fortress.