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More than 400 papers were submitted to the 51st
contest by artists and intellectuals from 10 countries. This year,
Havana-based Casa de las Americas cultural institution will grant as
well the Bicentennial Extraordinary Prize of the Hispano-American
Emancipation.
The inauguration ceremony was attended by President
of the Cuban Parliament Ricardo Alarcon de Quesada, historian Pedro
Pablo Rodriguez and the director of the Casa de las Americas’
Literary Study Center Jorge Fornet, among other personalities.
Fornet said since the first edition of the contest,
more than 25,000 works have been submitted and noted that this year,
the Casa magazine and publishing house are celebrating their 50th
anniversary.
The contest includes the genres of poetry, theater,
Brazilian and Caribbean literature either in English or Creole and
texts dedicated to the bicentennial of the Hispano-American
emancipation.
In reference to the date, Pedro Pablo Rodríguez
recalled Cuban national hero Jose
Marti’s speech known as “Mother America” delivered in 1889, when he
said a second independence process was about to begin in the
continent.
Rodriguez said Haití was the pioneer of the
liberation wars in the continent. He paid tribute to the heroes and
millions of men and women who participated in that deed and
highlighted that Our America is today ready to finish what was begun
200 years ago.
The members of the jury will travel to Cienfuegos, a
city in the southern coast of central Cuba, where they will evaluate
the works in the contest and will carry ut a program that includes
book presentations, lectures and meetings with Cuban colleagues.
On the 25th, the jury will return to Havana to resume
the program with a round table about the Hispano-American
independence and the opening of an art exhibit named From Haiti to
Mexico: revolutions, with pieces by artists from Argentina,
Colombia, Haiti and Mexico, among them Jose Guadalupe Posada and
David Alfaro Siqueiros.
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