leonard cohen

leonard cohenCanadian poet and singer-songwriter Leonard Cohen was named Wednesday as this year's recipient of Spain's Prince of Asturias Award for letters for "emotional imagery in which poetry and music are fused in an oeuvre of immutable merit."The jury in this northwestern Spanish city also noted that the 76-year-old artist's body of literary work "has influenced three generations of people worldwide."He beat out countrywoman and short-story writer Alice Munro and English novelist Ian McEwan, who were also among the 32 original candidates to be selected as finalists.Cohen, a native of Montreal who also was a candidate this year for the Prince of Asturias Award for the arts.



which was won by Italian conductor Riccardo Muti, is the author of the poetry collections "Flowers for Hitler," "Parasites of Heaven" and "Let Us Compare Mythologies," inspired by Spanish poet and dramatist Federico Garcia Lorca.He also has written novels such as "The Favorite Game" and "The Beautiful Losers." "The passing of time, sentimental relationships, the mystical traditions of the East and the West and life sung as an unending ballad make up a body of work associated with certain moments of decisive change at the end of the 20th and beginning of the 21st century," the jury said.


The letters honor, which last year was conferred on Lebanese author Amin Maalouf, is the fifth of eight Asturias prizes to be awarded this year, each accompanied by a 50,000-euro (roughly $72,000) cash prize.The recipients also receive a sculpture by Joan Miro that represents and symbolizes the awards, a diploma and an insignia bearing the foundation's coat of arms.The Prince of Asturias Foundation says its letters prize is bestowed upon "the person, institution, group of people or group of institutions whose work or research constitutes a significant contribution to universal culture in the field of Literature or Linguistics."

leonard cohen