Last week the first three winners of the Euskadi Literature Awards were announced: Arantxa Urretabizkaia, Patxi Zubizarreta and Joseba Larratxe. The second part of the winners has been delivered this Monday. Four prizes were awarded: Essay in Basque, Literary translation to Basque, Spanish literature and Essay in Spanish.
Maialen Berasategi and Joxe Mari Berasategi translate to Basque the work of Abdulrazak Gurnah, Nobel Prize in Literature: Paradise. In the opinion of the jury members, the translators have achieved a “sweet reading text”, “sufficiently far from mechanical translation”. The jury considers that “without moving away from the classical tradition of the written Basque Country, the distant and strange African world approaches without any impediment the Basque reader, turning reading this book into joy and pleasure for the ear”.
As for the Euskera Test, the jury rated Miren Billelabeitia "The One Wants." Recalling the word, living reading, the book "defends the pleasure and importance of reading". They have also highlighted the "ability to give classics to the themes of the day", beyond writing "elegant style, cultured writing, thoughtful and refined prose".
Essay in Spanish, Ander Izagirre
The jury of the Euskadi Prize for Literature awards the book Vuelta al país de Elkano by the Donostian journalist. The jury has highlighted that it offers "demystification" of heroic characters and has successfully chosen techniques and relevant details of paused journalism.
Finally, the Madrid writer Alejandro Morellón has been the winner of the Literary Prize in Spanish for his book The worst possible scenario. The jury highlighted "the relationship between the unusual and the wonderful, the great intelligence and the black humor" and highlighted that it makes the reader an "apathetic being".