Annual awards

Romania’s case is a clear exemplification of the relationship between literary studies and modernity seen as a cognitive, ethical and political project. All the key moments toward a more comprehensive definition of modernity and modernisation in the Romanian culture are closely linked not only with literary creation and the processes of assigning value to it, but also with the rethinking of the civilising mission of literature, its condition as a determining factor both of the history of ideas and of the finely calibrated schools of thought within it. Literature, together with its comparative and general study, has proven to be a privileged space in the Romanian culture, a space of intersection between these two realities. Literary studies shape the types of intersection between the different dynamics of ideas and the associated expressive sensibility, mirroring, but also actively involved in, these moments of radical transformation or diversification concerning the objectives and values ascribed to human existence. An intrinsic defence of the inextricable relationship between the multilateral reflection upon literature and the very foundation of civil liberties and the democratic ethos is based on the reality that, as Romanian history attests, general and comparative approaches to literature have shown themselves to be one of the most important defence lines against anti-liberal, discriminatory, resentful and totalitarian doctrines.

Since 2004, a judging panel, comprising members of ALGCR and headed by the President of the Association, has been awarding annual prizes to the most accomplished works of Comparative Literature and Literary Theory published in Romania in the previous year. The two prize categories are occasionally accompanied by one dedicated to first-time authors and, since 2017, by a category meant to encourage the theoretical and comparative perspective in Romanian Language and Culture Studies.

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