Portuguese Gonçalo M. Tavares wins the Formentor

The Portuguese writer, playwright, and poet Gonçalo M. Tavares (Luanda, Angola, 1970) is the winner of the 2026 Formentor de las Letras Prize, which was decided this Tuesday in its sixteenth edition. He was awarded for being "a skilled portraitist of the paradoxical epic of contemporary disorientation" and author of a narrative corpus "whose extravagance can be attributed to the most unusual, strange, and unexpected dimensions of the human condition."

Granted by the Formentor Foundation, the prestigious award comes with a prize of 50,000 euros. It will be received by Tavares, considered by critics as one of the most original voices in current European narrative.

The prize recognizes the intense literary career spanning two decades of the third most translated Portuguese author after Fernando Pessoa and Eça de Queiroz. His career is marked by his originality, formal innovation, and a deep inquiry into the shadows of the human condition.

Gonçalo M. Tavares is the third most translated Portuguese author after Fernando Pessoa and Eça de Queiroz

The renowned Portuguese author "belongs to a literary genealogy dedicated to narrating the reverse side of reality." This was highlighted by the jury's decision, composed of Ellide Pitarello, Gerald, Martín, Sonia Hernández, Pilar, Del Río, and Basilio Baltasar. They unanimously awarded "the audacity with which Tavares has built a narrative alien to the temptations of obviousness and for narrating the paradoxical epic of contemporary disorientation."

The decision emphasizes how Tavares "enriches the scene of great literature, follows the trail of narrative disorder in the experience of existence, and evokes the parabolic allegory of the enigma." The jury also highlights him as the possessor of a work "of powerful personality, dazzling originality, and vigorous imagination."

Extensive Work

With a multidisciplinary background, Tavares studied Physics, Sports, and Art before dedicating himself to teaching. He is currently a professor of Science Theory and Epistemology at the University of Lisbon.

Since his debut in 2001 with 'Livro dança', he has built a vast body of work translated into more than 50 languages and published in nearly 70 countries. Critics highlight his surgical precision in language and his constant exploration of the limits of logic and reason. Among his extensive production, the 'The Kingdom' series of novels stands out, including titles like 'Jerusalem' and 'Learning to Pray in the Age of Technique'; the series of short fictions 'The Neighborhood' and the monumental epic 'A Journey to India'.

The Formentor was a precursor to the Nobel Prize in Literature for Annie Ernaux and László Krasznahorkai

His most recent title is the satirical and dystopian work 'The End of the United States of America' (2025). In Spanish, he has published 'Mateo Lost His Job' (2023); the complete edition of 'The Kingdom' (2018), 'A Girl is Lost in the Twentieth Century' (2016), 'The Neighborhood' (2015), and 'A Journey to India' (2014), published by Seix Barral.

Before this, Tavares has received multiple awards such as the José Saramago Prize (Portugal, 2005), the Camilo Castelo Branco (Portugal, 2006), the International Trieste (Italy, 2008), and the Belgrade Poetry Prize (Serbia, 2009). He was awarded the Best Foreign Book Prize (France, 2010) for 'Learning to Pray in the Age of Technique', the Oceanos (Brazil, 2007 and 2011), the European Literary Prize (2011), the Vergílio Ferreira (Portugal, 2017), the Bellas Artes Margarita Michelena (Mexico, 2019), and the Prix Laure-Bataillon (France, 2021).

The Formentor recognized in its first stage Jorge Luis Borges, Samuel Beckett, Saul Bellow, Jorge Semprún, and Witold Gombrowicz, among others. After its revival in 2011, fifty years after its first edition, it was awarded to Carlos Fuentes, Juan Goytisolo, Javier Marías, Enrique Vila-Matas, Ricardo Piglia, Roberto Calasso, Alberto Manguel, Mircea Cartarescu, Cees Nooteboom, César Aira, Liudmila Ulítskaya, Pascal Quignard, or Hélène Cixous, in the last edition. It was a precursor to the Nobel Prize in Literature for Annie Ernaux (Formentor in 2019 and Nobel in 2022) and László Krasznahorkai (Formentor in 2024 and Nobel in 2025).