A total of 18 young writers were recognized with mentions or awards in the Calendar Award, the most important award given each year by the Hermanos Saíz Association. A prestigious jury in the different categories evaluated the 196 works in competition.
As announced today on the organization's social network profiles, in the Narrative category, the loudest applause went to Geonel Alejandro Rama Alemán, for his work "Sinfonía de las cavernas"; while Carlos Ávila Villamar received a mention for "Fósiles".
In the Poetry category the jury awarded Laura Domingo Aguero for her work "Memoria". It also decided to award mentions to Raúl Leyva Pupo for "Los secretos del fuego", and Elizabeth Casanova Castillo for "El eje del mundo".
In Theater, the absolute prize went to Marcel Méndez Fariñas for the play "Los estultos".
In Essay, the winner was Milagro Álvarez Leliebre for the research "Entre la integración y el negrismo. La problemática racial en la prensa cubana (1959)"; the mentions went to Lisandra Lefont Marín and Juan Carlos Ramírez Guerra for "Gobierno abierto y revolución 4.0. Debates to update the management of public affairs in Cuba". In this category, Rubén Ricardo Infante also received mentions for "La isla imaginada. Aproximaciones a una década de poesía (2000-2010)"; Leidys Domínguez Camejo for "La representación del negro en la obra investigativa de Lydia Cabrera y su relación en el afrocubanismo (1952-1959)".
In Science Fiction the award went to Raúl Piad Ríos for "A la sombra del mundo hogar", and the mention went to José Alejandro Cantallops Vázquez for "El símbolo del silencio".
Finally, in Children's Literature, the prize went to Michel González Basnueva for "El canto de la ballena azul". Mentions were given to Yeney de Armas García for "Un mundo allá afuera"; María Laura Germán Aguiar for "Fabio", and the first mention went to Barbarella D'Acevedo for "Un tren para Salinger".
Due to the epidemiological situation caused by Covid-19, for the first time the Calendar awards will be announced online only. When the circumstances allow it, the award ceremony will be held, as well as the presentation of the printed books, winners in the 2020 edition.
JURY RECORDS
2021 CALENDAR CONTEST
SCIENCE FICTION AND FANTASY 2021
On the 28th day of the month of December 2020, the jury of the contest Science Fiction and Fantasy Calendar 2021, composed of Raul Flores, Carlos Duarte and Raul Aguiar decide, unanimously, to award:
Award to:A la sombra del mundo hogar, by the author with the pseudonym "Elessar", who when opening escrow responds to the name of Raúl Piad Ríos, for the excellent handling of narrative resources, in a novelette that surprised the jurors since it seems written by a professional author, with impeccable cleanliness and editing, and that offers us a story that shares in a very effective way the thematic elements of space travel with the cyberpunk subgenre, in the best style of a William Gibson.
Likewise, the jury decided to award a mention to the book El símbolo del silencio, by the author with the pseudonym "Axel", who upon opening the envelope responds to the name of José Alejandro Catallops Vázquez, for a very well written book with an original theme, a heroic fantasy novel where the magic linked to tattoos is recreated in a very well structured worldbuilding or constructed universe with interesting characters and conflicts.
The jury also congratulates the organizers of the contest for the large number of authors who decided to send in this category of fantasy narrative, as well as the happy idea of convening online, which we believe facilitated the increase in the number of participants and the quality of many of the works submitted.
And for the record, the following sign the present minutes
Caridad Atencio, Arístides Vega, Roberto Manzano
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THEATER CALENDAR AWARD 2021
The jury of the Theater Calendar Award 2021, composed of theater director and leader of the company Teatro de La Luna, Raúl Martín, theater director and playwright Carlos Sarmiento, and playwright and professor Yerandy Fleites, appointed by the organizing committee of the Asociación Hermanos Saíz to carry out the decision of said call, decides:
To recognize, taking into account the wide level of call for entries, the vitality of the Award as a space of stimulation for young playwrights in Cuba.
To highlight the quality of the works in competition which, in clear proportion to the number of participants, suggests a very favorable state of the art for current Cuban playwriting.
Finally, the Jury, after extensive reading and discussion sessions, unanimously decided to award the 2021 Calendar Award to the text: Los estultos, which under the pseudonym Erasmo Büchner, presented in competition Marcel Méndez Fariñas.
Los estultos is a work that stands out for the imagery with which its author manages to establish discursive (and categorical) bridges with Woyzeck, the enigmatic play by Georg Büchner, and one of the great ghosts of theatrical historiography and contemporary dramaturgy. Los estultos subverts its historical referent through a very personal process of contamination of the reality it approaches, creating a parodic device from the everyday and from the theatrical, subversive. Its author appeals with intelligence, from the enunciation itself, to the standards of the mechanisms of dramatization of the avant-garde and post avant-garde, creating a novel framework both from the language and the characterizations, as well as from the self-sufficient proposal of staging to which it aspires.
On a poetics of vanity or the purpose of banality as poetics. Possible questions from others that become one more. The author has dissimulated the ghost to legitimize it again, and in that healthy abomination of "new man", to constitute an a-historical creature, potentially dangerous.
And for the record, they sign below,
Caridad Atencio Arístides Vega Roberto Manzano