Luanda – The Angolan writer Boaventura Cardoso is the winner of the 4th Dstangola/Camões Literature Prize with the novel book “Margens e Travessias” (Margins and Crossings), published in 2021.
The competition is a promotion of the Portuguese company Dstgroup in partnership with the Camões Institute.
The prize valued at 15,000 euros, of about 6.3 million kwanzas is scheduled to be handed over in October this year.
According to the organizers, the various works put out for the competition were analysed by a jury composed by professor Irene Guerra Marques (chairwoman), professor Manuel Muanza and journalist Carlos Ferreira, which was in charge for the analysis, choice and rationale of the award-winning work.
“The attribution of the prize to the author Boaventura Cardoso, is essentially based on the fact that it is a work that reflects, better than ever, a writer that has accustomed us, over the years, to an exhaustive work that constantly balances between a very rich creativity, but also very disciplined”, highlighted the jury of the award, on a note.
In the jury's assessment, between the imaginary, the realistic, the religious, the musical aspect, Boaventura Cardoso makes use of the same methods that made him one of the best prose writers in the History of Angolan Literature.
The Dstangola/Camões Literature Prize, which distinguishes books published in poetry and prose from writers born in Angola, already distinguished authors such as Zetho Cunha Gonçalves in 2019, Pepetela in 2020 and Benjamim M´Bakassy, last year.
Boaventura Cardoso has a degree in social sciences by the São Tomaz de Aquino Pontifical University “Angelicum” of Roma, is founding member of the Angolan Writers Association (UEA) and is author of the books “Dizanga dya Muenhu (1977), “O Fogo da Fala” (1980) and “A Morte do Velho Kipacaça” (1987), the novel books “O Signo do Fogo” (1992), “Maio, Mês de Maria” (1997), the novel book that was awarded the National Prize for Culture and Arts in the Literature category “Mãe, Materno Mar” and “Noites de Vigília” (2012) and “Margens e Travessias” (2021).
The writer is an honorary member of the Palmense Academy of Letters (Brazilian State of Tocantins) and he holds the Order of Cultural Merit in the Comendador class, granted by the Federative Republic of Brazil in 2006. It is dictionarized in the Novo Aurélio by Aurélio Buarque de Holanda.
Boaventura Cardoso from 2016 to 2020 was the first president of the Angolan Academy of Letters, of which he is a founding member.
Currently he is a member of the Parliament for the MPLA political party.
