Dear Moza, being one of my favorite poets, and one of the collaborators in the section of the Albanian criticism network in the "Mapo" newspaper, I was surprised when I read your article about the "Kadare" award and, in general, about the debate that has caused the third edition of this award.
Initially, I would like to say that the surprise, in fact, is not only yours, it is representative of the finding of the general lack of emancipation in the Albanian literary environment. I have just entered the framework of the literary initiative of the European University of Tirana during these years to structure, to build, to make functional and legitimate in terms of quality the "Kadare" literary award, an award that is already given for the third time, and I believe it is gaining more and more attention. The lack of emancipation is surprising. Well-known writers who refuse to be on the jury because they don't want to be in trouble, jury votes that fight and quarrel with each other, award participants who, after that, don't even deign to come and consider the honoring ceremony of a colleague of them, that in any case one would be the winner and there would not be 40 or 50 Albanians.
But above all, this year, I was surprised by the very harsh reactions of two of the favorites for this award, Virion Graçi and yours, since you were on the short list of five finalists. Tamam-tamam is a known thing of banality, meanness or wickedness of literary environments everywhere in the world. But I thought that this wickedness belonged to peripheral, unrealized writers or writers who try to project the mechanism of failure to the literary environment, time, era, conspiracies or anything else.
But, personally, I am very disappointed that the typical representatives of this phenomenon are you and Virion Graçi, two authors whom I personally know and respect.
Beyond the personal moment, I think the great exaggeration about this topic is worth stopping, analyzing and going further.
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Virion Graçi calls the "Kadare" award a failure
First, times have changed dear Moza. We live in a time of freedom, and no one has an obligation to anyone, and no one is accountable to anyone for the construction of an award, a jury, the way they vote or the way an award is awarded. All the more, as I said, that there are big centers, big characters that condition the prices, the Albanian literary export for 27 years after an entry into the free world, where the freedom of circulation of ideas, translations is complete. Even chaotic. As such, we have taken the literary initiative to build the Kadare award as a way to encourage the Albanian author, who writes in Albanian, Albanian literature, not only through an award, with a very good monetary value, of 10 thousand euros, but also through publication and public relations, advertising of this author within one year after the publication of the winner. This is what we did with the winners: Rudolf Marku, Shkëlqim Çela and this is what we will do with Musa Ramadan.
Instead of this initiative deserving a salute or at least indifference, paranoia to the point of nonsense is raised in circulation regarding schemes, counter-schemes or controls of this award, for which I and the jury, there are ten names, that every year we have been and we are witnesses.
Secondly, Ismail Kadare, our outstanding writer who had the understanding to allow us to name the award "Kadare", precisely for the encouragement of the Albanian author, to increase the reputation of the Albanian author, to increase the reputation of this award, which is in basis of purpose, brings to my attention one of his sentences. Three years ago, when Kadare, after many hesitations (because debates of this nature could arise), gave us permission to name the award, saying: "If you think this serves Albanian literature and its promotion, why not. But I don't want, for any reason, to have anything to do with the process, the winner, the names". And, in fact, that's what happened. The jurors of the Kadare Prize have voted freely, during these three years, for the author they thought, carrying out a transparent process.
A judgment that remains subjective anyway, but such are the prices, from the day they are created until the world goes down.
Third and most important, Kadare's contribution through this award for Albanian authors, which differs significantly from the international Kadare award from the mid-90s, has something additional to emphasize: Kadare through prefaces, recommendations, discussions, essays his has encouraged Albanian literature, the new author or the Albanian author here and abroad.
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Kadare vs Koha
I remember some prefaces, literary notes, interviews or parts from the book "Mëngjese ne kafe Rostand", where he mentions and promotes Albanian authors who have published abroad, the ladies of Albanian literature or the Albanian author in general who goes abroad. As such, Kadare deserves to be called a sui generis promoter of Albanian letters.
We must not forget, dear Moza, that Ismail Kadare is the only advertising brand of Albanian literature and Albanian culture that we have in circulation and that we can emphasize in the civilized world where the war, the competition for quality works is absolutely fierce, merciless .
The fact is that in these 27 years where the freedom of publications has been guaranteed, the freedom of circulation of ideas and cultural exchange with the outside world has also been guaranteed, we have not managed to produce, essentially, an author or a generation of authors internationally known Albanians. And for this, not only is Ismail Kadare not to blame, only literary mediocrity is to blame, or to put it in a more polite way, the missing quality of Albanian literature or authors to become internationally negligible.
Despite Kadare's help, promoting through forewords, notes, recommendations for many, many Albanian authors, international recognition was still not possible.
also
The Culture supplement of "Koha Ditore" brings a special issue dedicated to Ismail Kadare
Let's see if in the future, any representative or winner of the "Kadare" award will make the breakthrough. So, it will break the premises for an international fame of another Albanian writer.
Last but not least. Times have changed radically. Cultural and literary initiatives are no longer the property of anyone. They are the property of all. The constructive collaboration around these initiatives, prizes, and cultural and literary events is probably the literary bed where great talents can be born or cultivated. Which maybe one day we could have a new quality to overcome the borders of Albanian culture and enter the international literary environment.
