Canadian poet and novelist Margaret Atwood was recently named the winner of Spain’s Prince of Asturias Prize for Letters, which carries a prize of 50,000 euros (approximately $77,750), in recognition of the author's outstanding literary achievement and contribution to the arts. The jury selected Atwood from a poll of thirty-three nominees from twenty-four countries, stating that her multi-genre work “defends the dignity of women, and denounces social injustice.”
"I am thrilled and honored to have been awarded this highly important prize," Atwood said in a statement. "The Prince of Asturias Awards are not only a great tribute to literature, the humanities, and the sciences, but also to the universal project of building a sane, human society."
Atwood has written more than twenty-five books of poetry, fiction, and nonfiction over the last forty years. Her first poetry collection, Double Persephone (Hawkshead Press, 1961), was published when she was twenty-two years old, and her debut novel, The Edible Woman (Deutsch), was released in 1969. Atwood's novel The Blind Assassin (McClelland and Stewart) won the Man Booker Prize in 2000 and was a finalist for the Canada Council for the Arts Governor General’s Award, which she received in 1966 for her poetry collection The Circle Game (Contact Press) and in 1986 for her novel The Handmaid's Tale (McClelland and Stewart, 1985).
The Asturias Prize will be presented in October at a ceremony presided over by Crown Prince Felipe of Spain, after whom the prize is named. In addition to the cash award, Atwood will receive a sculpture by artist Joan Miró as well as a diploma and an insignia.
The Asturias Foundation, founded in 1980 "to contribute to encouraging and promoting scientific, cultural and
humanistic values that form part of mankind's universal heritage," has, since 1981, awarded the prize annually to eight honorees from various fields including the arts, sports, and social sciences.
