Guillermo Saccomanno Wins Alfaguara Prize

Guillermo Saccomanno (Buenos Aires, 1948) has been awarded the Alfaguara Novel Prize, which announced its twenty-eighth edition this Thursday. He won it with 'Arderá el viento', a novel he submitted under the pseudonym Jena and with a provisional title. Convened by Penguin Random House, the veteran award is endowed with 175,000 dollars - about 168,000 euros - a sculpture by artist Martín Chirino, and the publication of his novel in all Spanish-speaking countries.

The novel recreates the saga of the Esterházy family through an eccentric couple. "It is the story of degradation, of an agonizing peeling away, of deterioration, of how a foreign element causes a family to devastate a small society. Sex, money, and power are the core of the novel," explained the winner from Buenos Aires.

Saccomanno joined the Columba publishing house as a scriptwriter in 1972, beginning a career as a scriptwriter that would lead him to collaborate with illustrator Leo Durañona and to write the script for 'Fallen Angels' for Warren Publishing in the United States, or to create the police series 'Sam Malone', with drawings by Enio.

Saccomanno worked for the comic magazine Skorpio and dedicated decades to comic scriptwriting until he published the poetry collection 'Partida de caza' in 1979. In 1984, he ventured into narrative with 'Prohibido escupir sangre' and his short story book 'Situación de peligro'.

He combined comics and literature with 'Bajo bandera', 'Animales domésticos', and 'La indiferencia del mundo'. 'Bajo bandera' was adapted into a film with a script by Guillermo Saccomanno and Juan José Jusid. The publication of 'El buen dolor' established this storyteller with the National Novel Prize of Argentina. He also won the Biblioteca Breve Prize with 'El oficinista' in 2010.

The Colombian narrator Juan Gabriel Vásquez chaired the jury, which included writers and journalists Leila Guerriero and Manuel Jabois, film director and screenwriter Paula Ortiz; Andrea Stefanoni, owner of the Madrid bookstore La Mistral, and Pilar Reyes, director of the Alfaguara publishing house, with a voice but no vote.

This XXVIII edition of the prize received 725 manuscripts, of which 322 were sent from Spain, 93 from Argentina, 110 from Mexico, 89 from Colombia, 38 from the United States, 25 from Peru, and 21 from Uruguay.

The Alfaguara publishing house - the source that flows and runs according to its Arabic etymology - was founded in 1964 by Spanish builder Jesús Huarte and under the direction of the brothers Camilo José, Juan Carlos, and Jorge Cela Trulock. In its early days, the Alfaguara Novel Prize was created, which was first awarded on December 28, 1965.

In 1975, Jaime Salinas, son of poet Pedro Salinas, took over the direction of the label to develop an ambitious publishing project. He commissioned the design of the books to Enric Satué, who created a distinctive and exquisite image for its covers. The first in the collection was 'En el estado' by Juan Benet, followed by authors such as Julio Cortázar, Juan José Millás, Marguerite Yourcenar, Javier Marías, Thomas Bernhard, and Günter Grass.

In 1980, Alfaguara became part of the Santillana Group. The direction was successively assumed by José María Guelbenzu, Luis Suñén, Guillermo Schavelzon, Juan Cruz, Amaya Elezcano, and Pilar Reyes, who continues to lead the label today.

In 1993, the Alfaguara Global project was launched, which aimed for a common effort among Ibero-American editors to build bridges between both sides of the Spanish language. In 1998, the Alfaguara Novel Prize was relaunched with an international perspective. With twenty-eight editions, the award has become one of the most widely disseminated and translated in Spanish, awarded to an unpublished work.

In 2014, Alfaguara became part of Penguin Random House Grupo Editorial, and thanks to the group's international reach, it is now present in Spain, Portugal, Mexico, Colombia, Peru, Chile, Argentina, Uruguay, and the United States. Additionally, its books are exported to more than forty-five countries in Europe, America, and Asia.

Among its recent winners are Sergio del Molino, with 'Los alemanes' in 2024; Gustavo Rodríguez, with 'Cien Cuyes' (2023); Cristian Alarcón, with 'El tercer paraíso' (2022); Pilar Quintana with 'Los abismos' (2021); Guillermo Arriaga, with 'Salvar el fuego' (2020); Patricio Pron, with 'Mañana tendremos otros nombres' (2019); Jorge Volpi, with 'Una novela criminal' (2018); Ray Loriga, with 'Rendición' (2017); Eduardo Sacheri, with 'La noche de la Usina', (2016); Carla Guelfenbein, with 'Contigo en la distancia (2015); Jorge Franco, with 'El mundo de afuera' (2014); José Ovejero, with 'La invención del amor', (2013); Leopoldo Brizuela, with 'Una misma noche' (2012); Juan Gabriel Vásquez, 'El ruido de las cosas al caer' (2011) and Hernán Rivera Letelier, with 'El arte de la resurrección', (2010).