Madrid, 24 April. During a ceremony where the highest prize in Spanish literature was presented, the moment carried a weight of recognition and reflection for a lifetime of work.
On behalf of the Prime Minister, who was not present at the event, Iceta spoke with a steady, unequivocal honesty about the power of words to shield people from authoritarianism, to protect freedoms, and to defend human rights. His remarks framed the award as a beacon that gathers a country spread across continents and communities into one shared celebration. — Sources: EFE
In Alcalá de Henares’ grand Auditorium, Iceta noted that the laureate is the first Venezuelan to receive the Cervantes Prize for 2022, a milestone that filled him with happiness as well as pride for the long voyage that brought him to this city famed for its university and history. The tribute touched on a personal journey that took root here, in the shadow of Complutense University. — Sources: EFE
As the program unfolded, the head of Culture offered a concise portrait of the Venezuelan writer born in Barquisimeto in 1930. He emphasized that in Cadenas’s poetry, the word and the gaze join to shape an expansive aesthetic that resonates across time. The works Outdoor and Memorial, both published in 1977, stood as representative milestones in a lifetime devoted to inquiry through language. — Sources: EFE
The discussion recalled how the dictatorship of General Marcos Pérez Jiménez expelled Rafael Cadenas into exile on the island of Trinidad, then a British colony, for his participation in university student protests in 1954. The exile lasted four years, a period during which he learned English and engaged deeply with English and North American poetry. He returned to Venezuela in 1958 after the regime’s downfall and the establishment of democracy. — Sources: EFE
Shortly after returning, Cadenas began a lengthy teaching career that spanned more than three decades. In the classroom, he shared with students the reflections, anxieties, and doubts stirred by the poets he taught, turning lectures into living conversations about life, language, and wonder. — Sources: EFE
The minister recalled that Cadenas’s growing awareness of human frailty made many of his presentations questions rather than certainties, inviting readers to think rather than simply to observe. His approach opened a space in which poetry became an experience rather than a mere literary category, a distinction that would become a cornerstone of his teaching. — Sources: EFE
Cadenas, the author of The Nasty Character and a Few Words, is remembered for a pedagogy that his students describe as life teaching itself. Iceta recalled this as a pedagogy rooted in the practical wisdom of poems, a way of learning to see the world with clearer eyes and more compassionate patience. — Sources: EFE
In this view, poetry is not locked in a shelf of verse but lived as an ongoing encounter. The teacher urged students to approach poetry as a direct experience that can awaken questions, invite renewal, and demand defense against erosion of meaning. — Sources: EFE
After reading a poem published in the 1996 collection Gestiones, the minister highlighted the poet’s skill in making language precise and capable of bearing the weight of inquiry. Cadenas’s lines, concise and deliberate, invite readers to address, challenge, and reimagine the language that names reality. — Sources: EFE
Iceta also remembered that Cadenas translated poets who ranged from Cavafis to Herbert, Graves, and Whitman, the latter a voice considered particularly remarkable for its resilience and generous breadth of vision. The act of translation, in this view, was not merely linguistic work but a bridge that connected cultures and generations through shared poetry. — Sources: EFE