Welcome to the Official page of the Presidency of the Portuguese Republic

Minister for Culture,
Chairman of the Board of Leya Group,
Chairman of the Jury,
Honourable prize winner,
Ladies and Gentlemen,

My first words are to congratulate author Murilo Carvalho, winner of the Leya Prize for the best unpublished novel in the Portuguese language.

A book which stands out in such a wide and diversified universe, which is that of the Portuguese speaking people, is undoubtedly a work deserving of our appreciation and applause.

And more so since this prize was attributed by a panel which included prestigious names from several Portuguese speaking countries and was chaired by poet Manuel Alegre, an honourable representative of a kaleidoscope of literature which is today the basis of the wealth of our language.

I believe, for this reason, that I am interpreting the feeling of all those who speak Portuguese when personally addressing my sincere congratulations to the prize winning author and wishing him the greatest success in his career, both as a journalist and as a writer.

I also want to congratulate the Leya Group for having instituted this prize, thus creating an incentive and an opportunity for new values to become known in the various written works which are expressed in Portuguese.

For the Portuguese spoken word to be a reality, and not just an echo from the past, it is necessary that its area nurtures dynamic economic and cultural projects.

The need exists for men and enterprises capable of bringing to bear material initiatives with all the potential residing in the fact that we share a common language with so many countries.

Only in this way can Portuguese become in fact the pillar of a real community of independent States and an asset at the service of the development and prosperity of each of them.

In the world in which we live today, the wealth of nations does not only depend upon their natural resources and productive capacity. Other factors exist, equally or even more important, such as history, culture and language, which can greatly contribute to enlarge their horizons and their operative range in the international stage.

What is known today as «intangible heritage» is not just a factor for peoples’ cohesion, but also a decisive strategic factor in the relations between States.

We inherited a language which became autonomous over 700 years ago, a language in which two great literatures have congregated for centuries and in which, in the last decades, others have emerged which, although still recent, already possess, however, several works and authors of international renown.

The language of Camões and Vieira, of Machado de Assis and Guimarães Rosa, is now also the language of Agualusa and Mia Couto, to refer only two of the authors who are currently being more frequently translated in dozens of other languages.

We cannot throw out this asset, which is undoubtedly a matter of pride for more than 240 million Portuguese speakers, but which can and also must be faced as a competitive advantage, to be capitalized for the progress of our eight countries.

The simple fact that so many millions communicate in Portuguese, be it as their mother tongue, as an official language, or as a second language, makes it imperative that we find adequate means to promote it internationally.

Portuguese has to assert itself as a «global language», a language which may be heard in the four corners of the earth and which, exactly for this reason, justifies that others feel motivated in learning it as a foreign language.

We have thus placed the promotion of the Portuguese language as a priority theme in the programme of the Portuguese Presidency of CPLP.

The common interests of the CPLP Member States impose that work is jointly carried out towards the growing international assertion of the Portuguese language, particularly within the framework of the United Nations, where Portuguese has for long been justified to be granted the status of an official language.

But the importance of languages is not measured just by the number of speakers. It is also measured by the relevance of the culture in which each of them is expressed, the ideas discussed in it, the books written and published, and the environment in which it circulates and is accessible to whomever wishes to read or to listen to it.

In order that Portuguese reaches the status to which it has a right in the international stage, it is important that the spoken language, without losing its diversity – which is the main reason for its worldwide relevance – becomes an open area in which knowledge is produced and circulates, an area inside which language allays distances and eases relationships between people and between countries.

I thus consider extremely useful and laudable that initiatives such as this are promoted.

Initiatives that overcome the natural differences which separate us and which take advantage of what keeps us together.

Initiatives in which the geographic borders of each of the eight Portuguese speaking States are crossed, in order to think and act within the horizon of a fatherland made up of many fatherlands, the fatherland of all who speak Portuguese.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

The award of this prize is a tribute paid to author Murilo de Carvalho and to the notable novel he has written, inspired in the history of his Country.

But it is also a means of celebrating the Community of Portuguese Speaking Countries and the inestimable cultural and historic heritage upon which this community is based.

The emergence of quality in any of the written works that have meanwhile appeared in the language which we all share, is the best way of demonstrating the vitality of Portuguese and the unique role fit for it in the concert of nations.

Ipse dixit.