Mariano de Paco Serrano, Commissioner of Culture, Tourism and Sports of the Community of Madrid, presented the writer Álvaro Pombo with the Francisco Umbral Prize for his novel Santander, 1936 (Anagrama, 2023).
The event was held at the Real Casa de Correos, headquarters of the Regional Government, where De Paco Serrano described the winner as "a madrileño from Santander, a clear example of a novelist who has known how to carry out his craft in an honest way, achieving the highest awards. "As he himself highlighted in his incoming speech at the Royal Spanish Academy, he has loved Spanish literature and the Spanish language like no one else, and he has worked hard with them, and that can be seen throughout his career," he remarked.
Awarded by the Francisco Umbral Foundation, the recognition has been granted for the first time in its history by unanimous vote of all the members of the jury, who have highlighted in their ruling that it is "an exceptional novel against the current that shows high literature and sensitivity of which this author is capable.
