Ilonggo writer feted as Palanca hall of famer

ILOILO City – Joining the esteemed roster of the prestigious Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards for Literature Hall of Fame this year is multi-awarded Ilonggo poet, fictionist and author Peter Solis Nery.

He clinched the prestigious distinction after winning his fifth first prize for “Punctuation” under the Poetry for Children category in this year’s contest.

Winners of this year’s Palanca Awards were honored in the annual awarding ceremonies held at The Peninsula Manila in Makati City recently.

Now on its 62^nd year, the Palanca Awards received a total of 1,077 entries in 20 categories. Out of these submissions, 59 winning works were selected from 58 writers—with half (29 authors) are first-time winners.

Nery was inducted into the Palanca Hall of Fame for bagging a total of five first prize winning works. These are:

1998 – “Lirio,” Short Story – Hiligaynon
2007 – “Candido,” Short Story – Hiligaynon
2008 – “The Passion of Jovita Fuentes,” Full-length Play
2011 – “Donato Bugtot,” Short Story – Hiligaynon
2012 – “Punctuation,” Poetry for Children.

Meanwhile, during the gala ceremonies, the Gawad Dangal ng Lahi was conferred on guest of honor Department of Tourism Secretary Ramon R. Jimenez Jr.

Jimenez is a writer, mentor, former instructor, marketing communications expert, and one of the pillars of Philippine advertising.

As the creative force behind the latest tourism campaign, Jimenez hopes to build enough energy around tourism to give the Philippines a positive image, making it key driver of the country’s socio-economic progress.

The Palanca Awards, the country’s most prestigious and longest-running literary competition, was established in 1950 in honor of Don Carlos Palanca Sr.

The Awards aims to help develop Philippine literature by providing incentives for writers to craft their most outstanding literary works and by being a treasury of the Philippines’ literary gems from our gifted writers and to assist in the dissemination to the public, particularly the students.

Now hosting a total of 2,111 winning works, the Palanca Awards has been enriching the country’s cultural heritage by recognizing the best works all over the country. What started as a small yet potent collection of six short stories in 1951 has now grown into a wide and deep treasury of the finest of Philippine literature in 22 categories.

The Carlos Palanca Foundation currently has in its collection 542 short stories, 372 collections of poetry, 214 essays, 349 one-act plays, 188 full-length plays, 60 teleplays, 57 screenplays, 154 stories for children, 34 futuristic fiction stories, 83 student essays, 36 novels, and 22 collections of poetry for children. These winning works are continuously made accessible to students, and all researchers and lovers of literature through the Foundation library and its official website, www.palancaawards.com.ph.