The thriller has taken over the Hotel Palace tonight. César Pérez Gellida has won the Nadal Prize with that genre with the novel Bajo tierra seca. In an edition also marked by the celebration of its 80th anniversary, Pérez Gellida thanked for sharing the prize with authors of the stature of Ana María Matute, Carmen Laforet, Gustavo Martín Garzo, and Miguel Delibes, the latter two from Valladolid like him. He said this at the traditional literary evening held every year on Three Kings' Day on Barcelona's Gran Via. More than 800 manuscripts have been submitted this year for the award promoted by the Destino publishing house, endowed with 30,000 euros.
"Bajo tierra seca has traveled with me for years in my head. It's a novel I wanted to tackle when I felt that maturity of the craft. It is set in Extremadura in 1917, very difficult times, with poverty, large estates, caciquism, and hunger, a lot of hunger," explained the winner, who started writing ten years ago because he suffered from insomnia and always works with a hairdryer plugged in next to him. Pérez Gellida hopes that with the Nadal he will reach new readers, after having already gained quite a few with the 13 crime novels he has published. And he does not rule out that Bajo tierra seca will reach the big screen.
The jury of the 2024 Nadal Novel Prize, formed by Inés Martín Rodrigo, Care Santos, Lorenzo Silva, Andrés Trapiello, and Emili Rosales, chose Pérez Gellida among the finalists Si te pudiera prestar mi cielo, by Laura Macías, Hermanas, by Eba Martín, El legado, by Artemisa (pseudonym), and Manos de trapo, by María Regla. Pérez Gellida has taken over from Manuel Vilas, who last year won the award with Nosotros.
A double celebration, and not only because of the Three Kings' gifts, as this Saturday also saw the announcement of the Josep Pla Prize, a bit younger, created on the 25th anniversary of the Nadal and with 56 editions behind it. After Gemma Ventura won it last year with La llei de l'hivern, this time it has gone to Jaume Clotet with La Germandat de l'Àngel Caigut. "I suppose today I have become a writer," he declared upon receiving the prize. Clotet, formerly communications director for former presidents Carles Puigdemont and Quim Torra, explained that the winning work is "a thriller with a historical basis that travels from the Latin kingdom of Jerusalem in the 18th century to 21st-century Barcelona," with a monk from Montserrat and a Mossa d'Esquadra as protagonists.
"For me, the comfort zone was writing a historical novel," said Clotet, who until now had published two books of that genre, "this time, the challenge was to create a fiction that I had never done before." Clotet was one of almost 40 authors who submitted to the Josep Pla Prize, chosen by a jury formed by Laia Aguilar, Marc Artigau, Montse Barderi, Manuel Forcano, and Glòria Gasch. Valued at 10,000 euros, La Germandat de l'Àngel Caigut prevailed among the finalists Enxarxats, by Sami Vidal (pseudonym), 11990: Un diari, by Gaspar Jaén, Esprémer el temps, by Maria Mitjans, and La medusa, by Carles Solé. The two winning novels will be published on February 7.
The longest-running literary prize in Spain
It all began with a dinner at the defunct Café Suizo, located on La Rambla, in which six or seven people participated. It was January 6, 1945, a date chosen by the promoters of the award to free themselves from the overdose that the Christmas holidays had just left. In the first verdict of the Nadal Prize, with 26 novels submitted, the discussion was between the illustrious journalist César González Ruano and a manuscript that had arrived on the last day of the admission period from an unknown and very young writer named Carmen Laforet, only 23 years old. After five votes, the unexpected Nada ended up prevailing with the story of Andrea and her arrival in post-war Barcelona.
It all began on January 6, 1945, with a dinner at the defunct Café Suizo, located on La Rambla, in which six or seven people participatedNothingreaped great success, and continues to captivate readers who know little of those gray and hungry years, which benefited the literary prize that the magazine's director had devisedDestiny, Ignacio Agustí.The novelist had also wanted to promote the award, thinking of the Joan Crexells Prize that the Ateneu Barcelonès had established before the Civil War to give new life to Catalan narrative, awarding, among others, Mercè Rodoreda.It took Agustí's partners a little convincing, but his enthusiasm eventually defeated them and he proposed naming it Eugenio Nadal, who had held the position of editor-in-chief of Destino during its first issues and had just died at 28 years of age.
An idea that has rewarded new and well-known writers over 80 years in which there have been some changes of venue as it gained popularity, from Café Suizo to Glaciar in 1949 and from Glaciar to Hotel Oriente in 1950, until it ended up leaving La Rambla after 15 years to stay forever in what was once Hotel Ritz and is now Hotel Palace. Miguel Delibes, Rafael Sánchez Ferlosio, Carmen Martín Gaite, Ana María Matute, Francisco Umbral, Fernando Arrabal, Juan José Millás, Rosa Regás, Lucía Etxebarría, Lorenzo Silva, Andrés Trapiello, Francisco Casavella, Maruja Torres, Alicia Giménez Bartlett, Sergio Vila-Sanjuán, Care Santos, Alejandro Palomas, Najat el Hachmi... All of them, members of a long list of winners that always grows on Three Kings' Day.