Ana Blandiana, Romanian poet, wins the Princess of Asturias Award for Letters 2024

The poet, prose writer, essayist and journalist Ana Blandianaone of the most relevant and international figures on the Romanian literary scene and a prominent political activist, was awarded this Thursday with the Princess of Asturias Award for Literature 2024.

Author of more than thirty books of poetry, novels and essays that have been translated into more than 25 languages, Blandiana’s (Timișoara, 1942) candidacy won among the 38 competing for the award, which in the last edition went to the Japanese writer and translator Haruki Murakami.

Otilia Valeria Coman, or Ana Blandiana, as she called herself since she was prohibited from using her father’s name in 1978, was a firm opponent of the communist dictatorship of Nicolae Ceaucescu, and a prominent defender of human rights and democracy.

His father was an Orthodox priest declared an enemy by the Ceaucescu regime. She is a “radically unique creator,” with “indomitable poetry,” and an “extraordinary capacity for resistance in the face of censorship,” the jury assessed.

AND “heir to the most brilliant literary traditions, as well as a radically unique creator”whose writing poses “fundamental questions about the existence of the human being, in solitude and society, in the face of nature and history”.

After the fall of the communist regime (1989), Blandiana, the first person of Romanian origin to obtain a Princess of Asturias Award, founded and presided over the Civic Alliance (1991-2001), an independent organization that fought for democracy and made the entry of Romania in the European Union.

Titles such as ‘The vulnerable heel’ (1966), ‘The third sacrament’ (1969), ’50 poems’ (1970), ‘Events in my garden’ (1980), ‘The hour of sand’ (1984) or ‘Events on my street’ (1988), consecrated her in the world of letters.

And they helped him gain international recognition and obtain numerous awards and distinctions.

With information from EFE