Miguel de Cervantes Prize
The Cervantespreis, Spanish Premio Miguel de Cervantes and Cervantes Prize, the most important literary award in the Spanish -speaking world, and respected there, similar to the international Nobel Prize in Literature. The award is named after Miguel de Cervantes, author of Don Quixote. The winner will be announced towards the end of the year; the prize will then be awarded in the following year at Cervantes ' date of death, April 23, in his birthplace of Alcalá de Henares.
The award does not refer to a single work, but on the life's work of the honored author.
Candidates are nominated by the national language academies in the Spanish-speaking countries ( Academias de la Lengua de los países de habla hispana ); awarded the price by the Spanish Ministry of Culture. The award was first announced in 1976, during the period of transition ( the change from dictatorship to democracy in Spain ). Traditional - since 1996 without exception - a Spaniard and a Hispano- American to be appointed to the winners alternately.
The Cervantespreis was originally endowed with 90,000 euros; In 2008, the prize money was increased to 125,000 euros.