Prince of Asturias Awards 1981–2014. Speeches

10 O viedo | C ampoamor T heatre | Full of lucidity, depth and vigour, Kadare’s work is not limited to creating fictional characters and stories, because it begins with the deepest conviction that literature is not only entertainment or mere aesthetic recreation, but rather that it should contain a message and a moral commitment. If his creation as a novelist and poet is admirable, no less so are his essays on the culture of the Balkan Peninsula and the literature and art of Ancient Greece. From these he constructs a beautiful ode to the magnificent faculty of their authors to universalize the problems and dreams of those societies and to their warning —valid for their time and for all times— that the light and democracy engendered by their civilization are achievements that must be defended so as not to lose all that without which neither art, nor letters, nor even thought can fully transpire: freedom. The conferral of this Award not only recognizes one of the most important European writers of our time, but also someone who has been able to preserve and extol the beauty of the language of his country, Albania, and to build with this a body of work of universal resonance, written in the most part in a climate of extreme intolerance and authoritarianism, in which there shines a criticism of totalitarian power and its most perverse mechanism. An unceasing ode to tolerance and freedom, although it often had to be formulated through allegory, recovering old legends, in order to sidestep censorship and difficulties that seemed insurmountable. The legendary Olympic motto “ Citius, Altius, Fortius ” (“Faster, Higher, Stronger”) has a model and example in the Russian athlete Yelena Isinbayeva, a specialist in pole vaulting; a speciality that has undergone a progressive, extraordinary evolution and in whose ascent, in the continuous breaking of records, she has been a key figure. The conferral of this year’s Award for Sports on this exceptional athlete is thus a source of pride for us all. At 27 years of age, she has not only stood out in an extraordinary way for her values both as a person and as an athlete, but has received recognition at an early age as “the world’s best athlete”. In addition to being the only athlete in the history of this speciality to surpass a height of five metres, her sports triumphs include twenty-seven world records and eleven first prizes in Olympic, World and European competitions. However, we know she still has before her an open road on which she will surely continue to make every effort to break records and achieve new victories. All these successes of Isinbayeva’s are the result of iron will, of powerful, vital strength and of very special sensitivity, without which the sporting spirit would mean nothing. For all these reasons, Yelena Isinbayeva is worthy of the admiration and respect that we all profess towards her. We would like to see her extraordinary example instilled in our younger generations and in all those people who wish to better themselves and who aspire to a healthier life. In this way, we shall succeed in increasing the presence of sports in our time, in its continuing to create environments of coexistence and solidarity among peoples. There will perhaps be few cities in the world with a greater symbolic content than Berlin. Jean Paul Richter said of it that “it is more a part of the world than just a city.” And so we wish to proclaim with every respect, humbleness and pride that Berlin is today in Oviedo. And we wish to joyfully celebrate the 20th Anniversary of the Fall of the Wall with the conferral of the Award for Concord. A literary city forever linked to art and intelligence, it suffered terribly under the totalitarianisms that ravaged the last century and played a leading role in the most important events of European history. Devastated by the war that converted it into a fragmented, divided city, cut in two by an atrocious wall that not only separated Berlin and Berliners, but also all Germans, Europeans and the world. The fall of that wall, after so many dark years of sacrifice and pain, was one of the most exciting moments that we have been witness to and opened the way to German reunification, which we feel with special jubilation. While the citizens of Berlin, brimming with emotion, hugged one another “Unemployment, the most painful consequence of the economic crisis we are experiencing, offends our dignity as human beings and is our main concern.” 23 rd O ctober 2009