The elimination of the values of “dignity, solidarity and justice” and the popular jury in the bases of the literary prize named after the Extremaduran writer Dulce Chacón, which is awarded each year by the City Council of the Extremaduran town of Zafra, has put into question war footing to part of the author’s family, who died in 2003 at the age of 49. The decision of the PP municipal government has also caused the rejection of several of the former winners, as well as friends of the writer, who have signed a manifesto in which they criticize the actions of the Consistory. Dolores, María and Eduardo, children of Chacón, lead the 300 signatories.
“It is no longer my sister’s prize. She no longer represents Dulce and we do not want to give her a certificate of naturalness,” her sister Inma Chacón, also a writer, explains to EL PAÍS: “If the award does not respond to her values, it should not bear her name. If an agreement is not reached, the heirs may decide to remove his name.”
The narrative award had been awarded in the town for 20 years without changes in its foundations, but starting this year it will no longer include in its bases that the awarded books, in addition to their literary quality, have ethical principles, eliminating from their bases the author’s foundations. In that third point it was read that the awarded works had to be “linked to principles such as dignity, justice and solidarity, among other human values, thereby trying to associate the award with the vital and aesthetic career of Dulce Chacón.” Her sister justifies to this newspaper by phone that the award “has never had a political nature, it simply adjusted to the universal principles of human rights. Is it that the right doesn’t sign these principles?” she asks. The new rules decided by the mayor, Juan Carlos Fernández, have eliminated from the statement the phrase “honor the memory of the Zafren writer Dulce Chacón”, who, her sister remembers, has taken the name of this town everywhere.
Another novelty is that the members of the jury have completely changed, eliminating the popular jury. The mayor explained to EL PAÍS that he decided to make these modifications, published on April 11 in the Official Gazette of the Province, with the aim of “giving greater operability and transparency to an award that is awarded with public money.” The intention, the politician points out, is to “reward a quality work, whatever values it has. It should not be an award for either the left or the right, but for any ideology. The main thing is that it not be a mess. It is common sense that will dictate that it will not be given to a Nazi, obviously.”
The new jury is made up of “experts” such as the writer and general secretary of the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Youth of the Government of Extremadura, José Luis Gil Soto; the writer Rafaela Cano López, and also another of the writer’s brothers, Antonio Chacón. “We are not going against the jury or against the finalist works, we want it to be maintained. They have put my brother between a rock and a hard place,” says her sister Inma.
The mayor, who explains that he is the only one responsible for these changes, points out that this is an “interested controversy with a patrimonial sense” of those who do not accept an award that does not follow their criteria: “They have caused a mess for nothing. There is nothing against the writer, on the contrary. And those who have protested are only part of the family,” says Fernández, who also describes the writing against his decision as “a tantrum” by Luciano Feria, winner of the Dulce Chacón award in 2021, promoter of his fame and one of the 12 former award-winning signatories, including Luis Landero and José Ovejero: “If you want to change the award, make me proposals for next year and we will analyze them. “Show up for elections and publish it at your discretion, or organize an association with private financing, and let them keep the prize.”
Fernández, who remembers that he wrote a book about Dulce Chacón’s father and former mayor of Zafra, says that it is the manifesto that is causing “great damage that devalues the award, for not doing it the way they like and for its belligerent attitude.” His family points out that this “is an insult to Dulce and an excuse to take away the prize. The mayor has not had the courage to do it, because he has no argument, and he pushes the situation to it.
Among the signatories are the writers Manuel Vilas, Marta Sanz, Nuria Barrios, Máximo Huertas, Carme Chaparro, Nativel Preciado, Benjamín Prado, the journalist Paco Lobatón, the actresses Gracia Olayo, Berta Ojea and Laura Toledo, and the former socialist mayor of Zafra José Carlos Contreras Asturiano. “Why change the bases of a prize that was working perfectly and about which there has never been a complaint? Does this mean that the award no longer represents the values of the person who gives it its name?” They ask: “What is behind these changes? What are the criteria?”
Erasure of the popular jury
Another change in the award, worth 9,000 euros, is to eliminate the jury made up of the readers of Zafra, with about 16,600 inhabitants. The mayor is vehement on this point: “It was an ethereal thing, that we did not know how it was regulated, who was that jury, how was it decided? Nothing appeared in the award bases, and everything was opaque.” But the sister of the author of The sleeping voice points out that the vote of any resident of Zafra was one of the particular hallmarks of the award: “And it showed that there was no political bias. Above all, people from the book club voted, and the councilor certified it. But the mayor is completely unaware of the award.” Furthermore, the mayor also defends himself against the protest against those who point out that now the award will be somewhat more regional, given that the jury is expressly local: “It has coincided like this, but other years it may change, and aren’t there good writers in Extremadura? ?”
The finalist novels for this XIX Dulce Chacón Prize for Spanish Fiction are: Identityby José Antonio Leal Canales; I won’t see you die, by Antonio Muñoz Molina; Otaberraby Elisa Victoria; If this were a novelby Pilar Galán and A light in the night of Rome, by Jesús Sánchez Adalid. All published in 2023. The mayor uses Muñoz Molina, precisely, to defend his decision: “he is a well-known author and not exactly right-wing. But we don’t want to be constrained by values. If he doesn’t fall into one philosophy or another, nothing happens. We just want it to be drinkable, a good work, and obeying some values in itself does not offer a good work.” “Of course values matter,” says Inma Chacón: “And if they don’t like them, let them create another award, with courage and without subterfuge. The literary quality was already considered before.”
The writer Fernando Aramburu, one of the signatories and winner of the award, writes this Tuesday in his column in EL PAÍS: “The award has operated without hindrance for two decades, providing Zafra with cultural prestige. Once the arrival of a new municipal government led to a change in the presidency of the jury. These things happen. However, the bases of the award remained intact (…) In view of the mayor’s office, even the Junta de Extremadura has distanced itself from the councilor.” On May 21, the Minister of Culture, Tourism, Youth and Sports of Extremadura, Victoria Bazaga, pointed out that the changes introduced have been an exclusive decision of its mayor “under his discretion”, Juan Carlos Fernández Calderón, and that the executive regional “has nothing to say.” She also regretted if “any inconvenience” had occurred.
The councilor points out that this is a decision exclusively of the mayor’s office, and that the Board only provides part of the prize money: “Because you protest, I am not going to retract it. The law protects me. When they win, I will understand that they change the prize according to their ideology. I have the legitimacy of an election. “The total power belongs to the mayor.” Also the writer Julio Llamazares wrote a column in The Spanish newspaper against the decision: “The PP is bothered by the award itself.”
The award is organized by the Zafra City Council in collaboration with the Government of Extremadura and the Provincial Council of Badajoz. Works by authors such as Javier Marías, Andrea Abreu, José Ovejero, Belén Gopegui, Fernando Aramburu and Rafael Chirbes have won it and, in addition to the monetary prize, it includes sculpture Hug, by the Mallorcan sculptor Iñaki Martínez. Inma Chacón remains optimistic that in some of the future meetings, with the mediation of the board, the conflict that has caused great discomfort can be resolved: “The first thing is to add the popular jury again and for the next one add the bases of the previous ones. Is not difficult. And if an agreement is not reached, this will no longer be the Dulce Chacón award.”
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