Aleannys Argüello won the 7th Antonio Crespo Meléndez National Literature Biennial

Published at: 15/10/2025 10:23 AM

The young writer Aleannys Argüello won the award at the 7th National Biennial of Literature Antonio Crespo Meléndez, a Chronicle mention, thanks to her work “The Ritual”, a piece that captivated the jury for its depth, style and literary sensitivity.

Luis Alberto Crespo, Audio Cepeda and Lil Rodríguez, who made up the jury, unanimously decided to declare the work nominated with the pseudonym “Alma de Lumbre” the winner and which turned out to belong to Aleannys María Argüello López, as was confirmed after the opening of the escrow.

According to the verdict, “The ritual” is a chronicle in its exact dimension that “masterfully introduces itself to a theme that touches tangentically the Catholic, the Venezuelan popular collective imaginary and the African, something that seems to make more than one sad in our country where we recognize Africa as a mother, but only in words”.

In addition, the jury emphasized that “the treatment in this text involves not only the literary part, perfect in its narrative, but also a social part that is usually ignored, treated as 'something there' without taking into consideration not only the African part that is responsible, and how, to our country, but also to the cultural diversity enshrined in our Constitution and which no longer allows invisibilization”.

In addition, they concluded that the author of the winning chronicle “confirms García Márquez's maxim: a chronicle is a story that is true and, according to the story, this happened to her. It's an excellent reflection of a cultural diversity in Venezuela built on pain, a lot of pain and intensity.”

The winner, who has established herself as one of the most promising emerging voices in contemporary Venezuelan literature, will receive a cash prize awarded by the National Book Center (CENAL) and the publication of the book by Monte Ávila Editores.

MINCULTURA/Mazo News Team