After a five-year hiatus, the Querença International Literary Festival (FLIQ) will return in 2025 – and the writer Lídia Jorge will be honored. The announcement was made on Saturday, July 6, at the presentation of the FLIQ 2019 catalog, which honored Nuno Júdice and took place at the Manuel Viegas Guerreiro Foundation.
«FLIQ is one of the Foundation's most emblematic activities and we want to resume it as it was designed by engineer Luís Guerreiro in the past. Luís Guerreiro passed away in 2017, but FLIQ was resumed in 2018 and also in 2019, until the pandemic came and caused this interruption until 2022. Then, there were also changes in the board of directors, which took office at the beginning of this year, and this meant that this initiative of a large scale had to be thought of and designed with a stability of corporate bodies – and 2025 is the ideal year for this event to return", he told the Sul Informação João Manuel da Silva Miguel, current president of the Foundation.
It was also through João Miguel that it was known that Lídia Jorge would be the next honoree.
«Lídia Jorge is one of our greatest writers, at a regional level, in the country, but also in the world and, therefore, we thought that she would be the crucial and greatest reference for us to pay homage to», highlighted the president of the Foundation, revealing that the program is be agreed for the first half of next year.
As in previous editions (2016, 2017 and 2018), FLIQ 2019 also had the right to its catalogue, which was only presented on Saturday, during an evocative session at Nuno Judice, who died in March of this year.
The meeting remembered the Portuguese essayist, poet, fiction writer and university professor, born in Mexilhoeira Grande, and its highlight was the reading of the essay “Nuno Júdice – A Constelação Perfeita”, by writer Lídia Jorge.
In the words of João Miguel, «this was the way for us to bring Nuno Júdice, who was the person honored at the 2019 FLIQ, to the spotlight» and «take a journey through the journey of all the authors who participated in the festival, which has a dimension of Free General Studies, of people and of books, readings and writings».
The president of the foundation regrets that this initiative did not happen «in Nuno Júdice's lifetime», but reveals that the writer had the opportunity to see the finished catalog as a model.
For Lídia Jorge, this honor was more than deserved and «it is just the beginning of many».
«Nuno Júdice has officially left us, but the work is immense and, as you can see, it excites people. It is a poetry that, as I believe it is consistent and innovative, will endure and one day will be a classic», Lídia Jorge told Sul Informação, on the sidelines of this ceremony.
«This tribute is just the beginning of many that he will have and above all that will translate into an in-depth reading of his work, because he is a humanist, he is a man of human relationships between people, and his poetry has an aesthetic temperature very tall. Furthermore, he is today our most international poet, who has received awards all over the world and perhaps we still cannot assess his value,” he continued.
As for the return of the Querença International Literary Festival, in 2025, the writer stressed that this is an initiative «that is always under test», given that «the Algarve population is highly resistant to anything of this kind».
«So far, it has been a success and, therefore, what I hope is that, when it resumes, this continues and it manages to attract people to the interior – that is the big problem. If this is possible, it will certainly continue, because the idea is very interesting, especially if there are more local people around here who are interested and not just nomads».
Questioned by Sul Informação About how she feels knowing that she will be honored in the next edition, Lídia Jorge talks about “a time that passes”.
«Until now, I always said I wouldn't accept it, but now I have no other option and I'm going to accept it. I hope that, when it's done, it will be a party where I can give people something. I think more about what a work can give to people than what it does to me. Therefore, if my books deserve it, if, when reading them, people think they are interested, I will thank them», he concluded.
Saturday's ceremony also featured a musical moment, by Helena Madeira, reading of a biographical note by Nuno Júdice and her poetry, by Ricardo Marques, presentation of the catalog book Festival Literário Internacional de Querença: Catalog 2019, by Patrícia de Jesus Palma, and the unveiling of the plaque with a poem by Nuno Judice, on a bench in Praça da Fundação, by the writer’s grandchildren and wife.
Photos: Mariana Sedge | Sul Informação
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