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I am very pleased to award the Grand Prize for Romance and Novels to Francisco José Viegas, the youngest writer yet to receive this outstanding literary prize.

From today, Francisco José Viegas becomes included in the number of Portuguese authors as noted as Agustina Bessa Luis, Vergílio Ferreira or Lídia Jorge, amongst others, and this is undoubtedly the most important congratulatory message that can be given him.

We can say that Francisco José Viegas is a man of culture, recognized by the public and by his peers and that very justly deserved the prize with which he is awarded today.

But I would prefer to qualify the prize-winner as a traveller in the diverse forms of expression, a man of the media, in the ample sense that embraces all the most varied means of transmitting opinions, feelings, experiences, how he views or recreates that which raises interest or is inspiring.

A professor of linguistics, a journalist, author of television programmes, poet, novelist, playwright and travel writer, Francisco José Viegas is now consecrated, not just for his talent in writing and narrative, but also the generosity and the brilliance with which he communicates his love of life and his eagerness to see more, to know more, and to carry others in his approach to feelings.

I congratulate the prize-winner for his literary work, which disseminates and dignifies the Portuguese language, and am certain that the great future that is reserved for him will bring new and well deserved merits.

I equally congratulate the Portuguese Association of Writers and its President, José Manuel Mendes, for the memorable work that this association has undertaken on behalf of Portuguese culture.

The majority of the great Portuguese literary figures of the second half of the XX century were part of this institution, as well as relevant names honouring public spirit and freedom.

In these days of communications, in which writing is stylized and competes with immediate and formatted means of transmission, in which the image occupies a dominating and attractive space, writers are the most qualified depositories of that inestimable asset which is the language of a people.

They preserve it, improve it and adapt it to new circumstances. They revive it, in short, creating from the existing solid roots new models of expression and communication.

The strategic relevance of the Portuguese language in an international context must be enhanced, as well as the determining factor that deep knowledge of a mother tongue has in the education of young people and in their capacity to learn and to become conversant with all areas of knowledge.

Portugal is proud to possess a literary heritage which is permanently glorified and enriched, with notable works which are translated into multiple languages.

It is this wealth and this culture which we are celebrating today, honouring the will to continue branding with our presence the modernism of European and World culture.

I thus renew, in the name of the people of Portugal, the so deserving honour to writers, to the Association and, very specially, to Francisco José Viegas, to whom I wish great and continued success.