Xavier Mas Craviotto and Jordi Sebastià have been winners this Sunday of the Ciutat de Gandia 2022 literary awards. The first has been recognized with the 6th Ausiàs March poetry prize for La llum subterrània while his companion has received the XLIV Joanot Martorell prize for narrative for the work A European Affair.
Edicions 62 will publish their books in January 2023. Un afer europeu tells the story of young journalist Joan Ballester, who travels to Brussels to cover a protocol event at the European institutions. There he learns of the imminent approval of a trade agreement that will lethally harm Valencian orange growers. It is then that he decides to stay in the city to investigate what are the true interests behind these agreements.
With this novel, Jordi Sebastià rescues twenty years later the protagonist of his first book, with whom he bears some similarities, since he has also worked as a journalist, as well as being mayor of his town and deputy in the European Parliament.
With regard to La llum subterrània, it is a book that has three parts, made up of sixteen poems each, and that both the author and the jury recommend reading slowly and slowly in order to enjoy "the precision of the verse ”.
The jury was formed by Maria Josep Escrivà, Rubén Luzón, Jaume Pont, Simona Škrabec and Jordi Cornudella in the case of the LX Ausiàs March Poetry Prize, while Joanot Martorell's jury included Xavier Aliaga, Pilar Beltran, Martí Domínguez, Valèria Gaillard and Víctor Labrado.
The Ciutat de Gandia awards are organized and managed by the Municipal Institute of Archives and Libraries (IMAB), an autonomous body of the Gandia town hall.
