Many journalists end up exchanging news for fiction. This has become evident in the 78th edition of the Nadal Prize and the 54th edition of the Josep Pla Prize, which have been awarded to Inés Martín Rodrigo, cultural journalist at ABC, and Toni Cruanyes, news anchor at TV3, respectively. They are not the first scribes to achieve this. Both awards, organized by the Destino publishing house, have a long list of journalists among their laureates, such as Miguel Delibes, Teresa Pàmies, Juan José Millás, Eva Piquer, Maruja Torres, Llucia Ramis, Sergio Vila-Sanjuán, and Cristian Segura, among many others.
Of the two winners, Cruanyes has been the one who has taken the most journalistic approach, with a portrait of his grandfather, who died in a nursing home during the first wave of the coronavirus. "I wanted to leave a record," he explained immediately after receiving the award, noting that writing this novel, titled La Vall de la Llum, served as "shared therapy" for his entire family. "I found myself with a novel when all I wanted was to remember," he confessed.
Not only does COVID appear, but the journalist goes back to when his grandfather was a child, with a similarly harsh reality to overcome. "It is a tribute to an entire generation of men and women who survived a war when they were children. And who now have had to face the pandemic from the nursing home," the author states.
The novel's title, La Vall de la Llum, refers to Canet de Mar, where Cruanyes was born and grew up, and also to the light he said characterizes the Maresme region. His grandfather's story serves to portray that of his surroundings and the changes that have occurred, as well as to uncover family secrets that have helped him understand his grandfather's figure a little more.
Cruanyes has indicated that in his novel "everything is true," even if it's hard to believe, emphasizing that what his grandfather and his contemporaries experienced might seem strange and very distant to us, but that, in truth, it happened only two generations ago. "I have extended my work as a journalist," he added, changing some of the protagonists' names, thinking that perhaps they would not be proud of what they did in the past.
Unlike Cruanyes, Martín Rodrigo has resorted to her own memory to invent, "a marvelous verb." "Any resemblance to reality is pure fiction," she insisted, assuring that those among her acquaintances who believe they recognize themselves will be mistaken.
In Las formas del querer, Martín Rodrigo tells the story of the crisis Noray experiences after the death of her grandparents, Carmen and Tomás, who taught her almost everything. Noray draws on memories to overcome the rough patch, taking refuge in the family home in the village where she grew up. From memory, Noray moves to writing as therapy, although the author has emphasized that "grief is not cured, it is a way of living, you get used to it," recalling the grief she experienced with the death of her mother when she was very young and with that of her first editor, Belén Bermejo, more than a year ago.
Martín Rodrigo has resorted to her own memory to invent: "Any resemblance to reality is pure fiction"Noray, like Cruanyes, faces the narration of her family history to end up finding her own story. She also provides a historical overview of the context that previous generations had to live through, ranging from the Civil War to the beginning of the 21st century. "Memory is fundamental for both literature and life," she defended.
The journalist, who has been writing this novel "all her life," confessed that winning the Nadal is "a dream come true." Martín Rodrigo also took the opportunity to praise its first winner, "my adored, beloved, and admired" Carmen Laforet.
A celebration still marked by the pandemic
The awards ceremony once again had a different format than usual, without the traditional literary dinner at the Hotel Palace. The location remained the same on this Epiphany Day, but the event was reduced to the announcement of the winners and a subsequent Q&A session, as happened a year ago.
This year has not been one of records as the previous one was. The winner of the 78th edition of the Nadal Prize, endowed with 18,000 euros, has stood out among the 937 manuscripts submitted, far from the figure achieved in the 2021 edition, with a total of 1,044 and Najat El Hachmi being the winner for El lunes nos querrán. Likewise, the winner of the 54th edition of the Premi Josep Pla, with an endowment of 6,000 euros, has been selected from the 44 works submitted. Last year, Maria Barbal was the winner of this award with Tàndem. The two winning novels this 2022 will be published on February 2.