Álvaro Pombo has not been able to attend the traditional lunch that the Kings offer every year at the Royal Palace on the eve of the Cervantes Award, which will take place tomorrow, Wednesday, April 23, in Alcalá de Henares. Pombo, 85, cannot attend this ceremony for health reasons. During the food in the Royal Palace, it was taken for granted that it will be his collaborator Mario Crespo – one of the main specialists in his work, present at lunch – who reads the speech of the Santander writer.
If last year, during the same lunch, the award -winning Luis Mateo Díez heard the speech directed by Felipe VI sitting next to the queen, on this occasion the words escaped the royal dining room without being able to catch them the halls because they were flying in the direction of the floor of the Madrid neighborhood of Argüelles where the Spanish novelist lives, the one who best philosopher through the narration to explore the ambivalent nature.
The King’s words – black corbate and severe dark suit, are days of official mourning – dialogue with the speech that Pombo read in 2004 on the occasion of his entry into the Royal Academy. Then they presented their candidacy Luis Mateo Díez and Luis María Ansón, the two also present at the Royal Palace. “Like many other colleagues and writers of my generation, I have loved Spanish literature and language, and I have worked hard with them,” Pombo then confessed and Retaked Felipe VI emphasizing the value of work with words. If on that great occasion Pombo reflected on the tension between truth and likelihood, based on the definitions of the Royal Academy, in his speech the king also threw from the Dictionary of the RAE to read two meanings of the definition of recognition. A recognition to Pombo for the moral dimension of his literature, which he connected with the tradition of Miguel de Unamuno, Antonio Machado and Gabriel Miró.
Although a brut Gaudí Panot reserve was not a good day for a festive toast. Too many absences. Applause in deaf. Some guests called on the Royal House asking whether lunch was suspended on the occasion of the death of the Pope. For Francisco they were the first words and then for Mario Vargas Llosa, two global figures whose mother tongue was Spanish. At coffee time, in the corrillos that seem to dance a minute to approach the kings, Felipe VI recalled one of his first meetings with the Peruvian writer during which he first felt examined and then they could already have a relaxed conversation. One of the writers invited to lunch tells it: most writers attending the event have been laureate during the previous year (El Azorín, El Tusquets, the Loewe, the Brief Library …). There was also, among others, María Dueñas, who remembered the generous blurb (Promotional phrase in the book of the book) that Vargas dedicated to an English translation of his novels.
Several of the attendees paid yesterday the five euros on the digital platforms to see the movie Conclave. “If you’ve seen it will not be a sword.” Felipe VI explains that he saw it months ago and points out as a key moment of the film the instant after the explosion that interrupts the vote. A welter enters the Sistine Chapel, lifts the card where Ralph Fiennes will write the name of the candidate. The headquarters of Rome is vacant, also that of Spanish literature and the Cervantes Álvaro Pombo Award thinks life from its floor in Argüelles.