7
P
rince
of
A
sturias
A
wards
1981-2014. S
peeches
Speech XXII
Many years have now gone by since we began, full of hope, to hold this ceremony, and it is an
enormous joy to see how our Awards have become established and are more and more a cultural
and social reality of the highest magnitude.
What was at the outset little more than a hopeful project and an obstacle-ridden challenge is
now a major, well-established, prestigious event with ever-greater international resonance, which
augurs it the brightest of futures.
Achieving such success, which I am well aware has been by no means easy, validates the
philosopher’s conviction that our lives take on a deeper meaning when we strive to fulfil our
dreams. For this reason, I would like to reiterate my recognition of our Trustees, of the members
of the Juries for the Awards and the people who have given over many hours of their lives to the
Foundation with discretion and generosity.
I return to Asturias to relive all these sentiments once again, with the emotions of the home
comer, of somebody returning to a land where affection and human warmth are never lacking. The
people of Asturias have always known how to open themselves to the outside world, to establish
dialogue, to lend themselves bravely to the noblest of causes. In the very special circumstances that
bring us together today, they unite in their heartfelt, noble hospitality to welcome those arriving
from so many parts of Europe and other continents to spend a memorable day with us. Asturias
knows how much I appreciate and value this generous attitude toward the Awards that bear their
name.
The beloved city of Oviedo is once again the forum where we reflect out loud about our deepest
concerns, which are often the direct outcomes of the changes that throw the world into turmoil
and alter it with uncontrollable force.
We aspire to making our Awards the voice of those who so often do not have that voice, the
voice of the abandoned, of those who suffer injustice, of those
who defend freedom and are persecuted for defending it. Their
struggle, which will never fail to be our struggle, strengthens
our faith that a fairer, more fraternal world, freed of terror and
fanaticisms, is possible. We have no wish to turn our backs
on hope; we wish to continue to believe in what the beautiful
verse of the unforgettable Borges termed “the dawn that works
marvels”.
The roll call of this year’s Laureates, like those of previous
years, is a truly outstanding one. It vividly expresses the
vocation at the heart of our Awards to be the very conscience
of our times, a stimulus to creativity and a spur to the highest
values. We wish them to serve as an example for society as a whole, but particularly for our younger
generation, who are always in our thoughts.
The American writer Arthur Miller, recipient of the Award for Literature, embodies in his very
essence the ideas and values we strive to extol. Twentieth-century theatre would be inconceivable
without the awareness raising that the work of this exceptional playwright propounds.
All My Sons
,
Death of a Salesman
,
The Crucible
,
A View from the Bridge
and
After the Fall
are
examples of a work unmarked by the passage of time. His work has become classic and is staged
time after time throughout the world’s theatres. His drama focuses in themain on the contemporary
problems of the average American, the strains and discords between parents and children, social
conflict, the strangleholds of persecution and the lack of freedom in environments dominated by
narrow-mindedness and prejudice. Thus, his work also deals with universal, age-old issues and
“We aspire to making our Awards the voice
of those who so often do not have that voice,
the voice of the abandoned, of those who
suffer injustice, of those who defend freedom
and are persecuted for defending it.”
