He culture Ministry through the General Directorate of Books, Comics and Reading, has prepared an agenda of literary activities around the celebration of Book and Copyright Day which will take place from April 15 to 26 during what is known as ‘Cervantina Week’ and which, precisely, has the Cervantes Prize as its protagonist.
The program of events will have as its image the poster designed by Luci Gutiérrez, 2023 National Illustration Prize winner, and the work has been inspired by a phrase by Luis Mateo Díez, current Cervantes Prize winner. “I live telling and I tell living, fiction is an essential part of existence“, picks up the phrase on the poster.
After the hanging of banners on the façade of the Ministry of Culture on Monday, April 15, the program of events will begin that same afternoon with an event organized by the General Directorate at the Ateneo de Madrid.
This is an evening of tribute to the last winner of the Cervantes, who will talk with Antonio Monegal, National Essay Prize 2023, and Aurora Luque, National Poetry Prize 2022, on the topic ‘Rethinking the world’.
The main act of the ‘Cervantine Week’ It will be the ceremony to award the 2023 Cervantes Prize to the Leonese writer. The event will take place on Tuesday, April 23 in the Auditorium of the University of Alcalá and will be chaired by the King and Queen, with the participation of the Minister of Culture, Ernest Urtasun.
That afternoon, the winner himself will begin the XXVIII Continuous Reading of Don Quixote, at the Círculo de Bellas Artes in Madrid, while, the day before, Mateo Díez will hold a meeting with the media, moderated by the general director of Books and Comics. and Reading, María José Gálvez, at the headquarters of the National Library of Spain.
The activities will continue on Thursday, April 25 with the inauguration of the exhibition ‘Living counting’ around the life and work of Mateo Díezco-organized by the University of Alcalá and the Ministry of Culture.
Subsequently, ‘Los dias y las cosas’, a photobook in tribute to the author, will be presented at the Cervantes Institute. Finally, on Friday, April 26, the writer will hold a discussion with students from the Complutense University.
PUBLIC LIBRARIES ALSO CELEBRATE
In parallel, the network of public libraries joins the celebration of Book Day with activities such as thematic exhibitions and meetings with authors, reading development workshops or children’s activities.
These actions include that of the State Public Library in Santiago de Compostela, which will carry out a literary walk through the city on April 23; or that of the State Public Library in Seville, with puppets for younger readers.
Likewise, the State Museums will join the celebration with another program of activities: thus, the Casa de Cervantes Museum, in Valladolid, will carry out its annual institutional event in which the writer has been invited to read a passage from ‘Don Quixote’ Nicaraguan Sergio Ramírez, Cervantes Prize 2017.
In addition, among the activities of the different museums spread throughout the territory, the creative writing workshop also stands out. ‘Inbetween times’ from the Cerralbo Museum, in Madrid; the illustration workshop ‘Images of images’ from the National Museum of Sculpture, in Valladolid; the ‘bookcrossing’ of museums and art centers of the Sephardic Museum, in Toledo; the storyteller ‘The Abduction of Europe’ at the National Museum of Roman Art, in Mérida; or the meetings ‘LEETRAS: Ethnographic experiments for social transformation’ in the National Museum of Anthropology, among many others.