FIVE writers from Argentina, Cuba, Uruguay and Brazil have triumphed in the 2007 Casa de las Américas Prizes in which 493 books competed in the categories of novel, essay, theater, testimony and Brazilian literature.

The award ceremony took place in the Che Guevara Room at the institute itself and was led by the juries who were responsible for the selections, together with Cuban Parliamentary President Ricardo Alarcón; José Ramón Fernández, vice president of the Council of Ministers; Abel Prieto, minister of culture; and Roberto Fernández Retamar, president of Casa.

Before announcing the prizewinning book – of 115 – Chilean novelist Poli Delano, said that he wanted "to confess a kind of sin," after seeing other verdant ceremonies, "whilst ours is rather dry, but it shows the new trend with respect to novel, the economy of resources."

The Casa Prize in the novel category was voted unanimously for Argentine Susana Silvestre’s Mil y una (Thousand and One) "for its fluid, clean and amusing prose, its intelligent structure, both complex and lucid; and for constituting a challenge in the face of trends demonstrated by publishing consortiums today."

It was the responsibility of Brazilian poet Ivan Junqueira to present the choice in the category of Brazilian literature, and he firstly commented that the jury had to read 212 different works, "an overwhelming contribution" to the Prize but "the winner was at the top of the list from the point of view of quality."

Also winning a unanimous vote, the prize went to Ana María Goncalves for Um defeito de cor, considered "a notable novel outstanding for its esthetic-literary elaboration" and in which they also appreciated that "the author has a tremendous power of evocation and the descriptions of the many varied historical contexts that are organically associated with the argument."

For the theater category, 121 titles were entered for competition and the winner was announced by Argentine Jorge Dubati: Rafael Spregelburd (Argentina) with Heptalogía de Hieronymus Bosch:6. La paranoia.

The decision of the jury for the testimonial literature selection – with 26 books – was given by Colombian journalist José Alejandro Castaño, and was awarded to Uruguayan Edda Fabbri for Oblivion, "for the discovery of a story of great testimonial and literary value that demonstrates not just the efficient use of narrative technique but also a valuable sensitivity that enriches and tells the story honestly. It is the chronicle of a political prisoner jailed during the years of the dictatorship in Uruguay."

Cuba won the Casa Prize in the essay section (artistic-literary on this occasion with 19 works entered) from the hand of Alberto Abreu and his book Los juegos de la escritura o la (re) escritura de la Historia. (Games in Writing or the Re-writing of History).

Argentine essayist Claudia Gilman read out the jury’s decision highlighting "the exhaustive nature and originality in the research into contemporary Cuban culture, the ambition of its purpose and the relevance of the questions it analyzes."

Abreu, naturally the only prizewinner to be present at the final ceremony of the 48th Casa Prize awards, commented to the press that for the research for his book he had received the Dador grant from the Cuban Book Institute.

"I have tried to document how the artistic-literary processes of Cuban culture over the last 40 years – the post-Revolution – have been obsessed with history, whether as an argument or by re-writing it. I traced different problems, complex areas, not just in literature, but also in the visual arts, essays, poetry, the novel. It is a book whose writing appeals to a definite mix, a certain hybridism because it mixes fiction with theoretical analysis, with critical analysis, with all the speculative games. It seems to me that now more than ever before it is necessary to unravel the problems in the field of contemporary Cuban culture; it is a book about ourselves."

Abreu said that he was proud to have received the Casa Prize "because of all that it represents for Latin America". Another of his books Virgilio Piñera, un hombre, una isla won the UNEAC Essay Prize.

Poet and essayist Roberto Fernández Retamar, president of Casa, announced the honorary awards that were conceded for the seventh occasion. The nominated books were published in 2005, he commented.