The award-winning writer from Ondara Jovi Lozano Seser has released a statement expressing his refusal to attend the delivery of the Enric Valor Novel Prize in Valencia for his work After maig, abans de l'estiu which is in charge of granting the Diputación de Alicante.
There have been several reasons that Lozano has expressed to communicate his decision, but all aimed at qualifying the organization and the award ceremony as a lack of respect:
For the dignity of our language, for the dignity of Enric Valor, for the dignity of literature in Valencia
The dignity does not preu. When someone begins to make small concessions, in the end life loses its meaning. The phrase is not meua, but from the writer José Saramago tot and that perfectly summarizes the synthesis of this communication that sign and embodies from a single white verse. I am a journalist and writer and I endorse a trajectory of Huit publications and a quarantine of literary prizes and recognitions both in the Valencian Country and in the Balearic Islands and the Principality, among which are the Ciutat de València Award, the Alfons el Magnànim Award or, in the case at hand, the Enric Valor Prize for novels in Valencia, organized by the Diputació d'Alacant since 1995. The awarding of the guardian was communicated last June, much later than it is known that hauria d'haver-se donat a conéixer el verdicte per parte de la diputació alacantina. The saved novel is published in October, when it was assumed that the provincial body would carry out an act of lliurament to donate the work and the guanyador to the public. Throughout this period, the person from the Alicante Department of Culture will respond to the communication regarding the release data. The summum will be that, in one of the random telephones, the date of November 5 is donated with the meu kept by the Evarist Garcia de Teatre in Valencia. Surreal. Pathetic. Intolerable from a department with destinies of techniques and techniques, trusted càrrecs and a pressupost as onerous as the one they hold. With all, patients and educators, go expect a setmanes gratat more sense no telephone cap or definitive electronic mail. Too bad, you will come on December 16 and they will call the communication department to inform me that you think they are coming, on December 21, there is some kind of false release from the guard with the name of the photo in the office of the vice-president of the Diputació d'Alacant and deputy of Culture Julia Parra. 10 minutes from reception, photo protocol·lària i al carrer. Simple. modest. Clearly. Since I was keeping the daily magazine that I presented to the municipal public radio live, I will not understand what I am invited to, nor will the press confirm my assistance. Tot and that in the first instance they were going to comment that yes they could, they have not suspected the framework of the call and the overcoming communication of the mateixa, they were going to decide that they could respond in a more accurate way. I, no: if I went there, I was granted a concession with which I commented at the beginning of this communication from Saramago. I, from the other band, no: l'proud d'haver-lo rebut is not a white man to accept with resignation the pantomime with which the Diputació vol despatxar the most important literary prize of the province and one of the most gifted of tot l'àmbit lingüístic. For all això, and for all the arguments that I will outline in this writing, you will transfer the meua indignation with the author and with a Valencian speaker.
One of the most ridiculous arguments put forward by the technique that on the phone is that the emergency call had to be at 11.15:9 a.m. from the office, “because in the afternoon it could not be done since no one works in the afternoon in the Provincial Council”. Em reiterate that the act s'havia de fer in the hours of the very slow installation, it is to say from 15 to XNUMX hours, and aleshores jo vaig to remember that in all the prizes that I have rebutted at the end of La meua carrera el lliurament s'ha realitzat en horari de vesprada i en un auditori, Casa de Cultura or similar. I was also going to think that the presentation simulation had been communicated late and badly, and that notifying three days of business beforehand is a lack of respect for the guard and the guanyador, at least from the organizational point of view.
It should be emphasized that the Enric Valor Prize is the most gifted narrative prize in the Valencian Country together with Joanot Martorell de Gandia, for which I believe that as the winner of the prize in this exercise, the mateix deserved respect and prominence than the previous winners calls. Així mateix, the arrival of the great Enric Valor does not deserve clandestinity and few ressò of a bureaucratic act and tancat dins the palace of the Diputació. If not, the greatest of all this process is that the Department of Culture has had all of 2022 to coordinate and organize this act and it has not been done, showing there an absolute lack of will to dignify the figure of Valor. It should be remembered that since some years and thanks to the efforts and sensibility of valuable personalities involved in the arrival of values, the act is held in Castalla, a town where Enric Valor is born, with the support and coordination of the city council. In addition, I was an author from Alicante, it was also very easy to find and all the possibility of presenting it to the municipality of Ondara, the main town and now the scene of the saved novel, tenant en compte, as they will comment , that the Castalla City Council did not have donat dates available: an other lie contrasted with the Castalla council, which has not been communicated three times in all of 2022. More people: more inept, mentiders. Rebre por tant la petition a duos setmanes d'acabar l'any és la provea fefaent de la poc interés de la departament y institució tanto pel premi com per la literature en valencià.
The great discrimination and shamelessness of the provincial body in linguistic and cultural terms, but, is the following: he quantifies the glamor and transcendence that is donated to the Azorín prize for novels in Spanish that the Diputació organizes together with the editorial Planet? The Azorin Award is awarded in a stable manner (always on March of each year) and with all the gatherings at the ADDA (Auditori de la Diputació d'Alacant) with all the luxury of public presence, symphony orchestra and media ressò. Fins i all Atresmedia came to donate support to the torn business group. Mónica Carrillo, presenter of the Antena 3 telenotícies and originally from Elx, from fet, will be one of the recent guanyadores. Així mateix, the endowment of the prize for literature in Spanish is €45.000 while that of l'Enric Valor is €20.000. Super egalitarian! Starting from the mateixa administració i tenint in compte the cooficialitat of castellà and valencià, the comparative greuge is evident and metaphoric. You shouldn't, back to the furtive call that promotes this communication, I assumed that the guanyador or guanyadora from l'Azorín is not notified at the end of each day so that he goes to the office of the vice presidency to get a photo and a note of press. Des d'aquest inequilibrat desgreuge, the Diputació d'Alacant demonstrates the lack of respect for my language and that of all Valencians and Valencians. Organizing a literary prize would not have to be an administrative act, nor would it be anonymous, but for the provincial body Valencia is a language of Segona, along with the writers in Valencia we are writers from Segona. The president of the Diputació d'Alacant, Carlos Mazón, de fet, only assisted the act of the Azorín because he is the only one who considers worthy and normative of the seua agenda while the Enric Valor Award does not deserve or so soles a dignified lliurament, both in advance, but rather have to settle for a miserable reception at the office of Mrs. Julia Parra at 11.15:XNUMX p.m. Yes: after lunch hour, do not follow that the express visit of the lletraferit estranger els disturbs the toast of mig matí.
It is for all of those previously exposed that he reiterates his refusal to attend a gathering that degrades the prestige of the award he has achieved and that he was disappointed in having to rebut it by an institution that només prioritizes the agenda of his deputies for Damunt of the contribution of authors and authors who are supposed to spread and collect. I felt ashamed and alienated with the writer and with Alicante. And it is that in all my artistic trajectory, with more than 40 prizes and literary distinctions, I have not felt so humiliated and, evidently, I am not going to contribute to pantomime, mediocrity and emptiness with which you intend to liquidate The edition of the Enric Value Award for Novel la in Valencia 2021: sense ressò, sense interest and, the one who is pitjor, sense wins. Oh no, thank you. Ladies and gentlemen of the Diputació d'Alacant: both of you, the literature in Valencia and the essential culture of my language and my people have a lot of loss. Per contra, he remembered that jo ja he guanyat.
Yours faithfully,
Jovi Lozano Seser
Ondara, on December 8, 2022
