16/12/2024

Andrea Rodríguez Prat, winner of the XLIV Fernando Rielo Award for Mystic Poetry with her work Exégesis

The work of the current director of the Institute of Culture and Thought and lecturer of Philosophical Anthropology stands out among 312 participants from 32 countries thanks to a poetry book that explores the relationship between light and shadow, grace and fall.

Writer and academic Andrea Rodríguez Prat has been awarded the prestigious XLIV Fernando Rielo World Prize for Mystic Poetry for her work Exégesis. The ceremony took place on 12 December at the Colegio Mayor de San Pablo CEU in Madrid and was attended by Luis Casasús Latorre, president of the Fernando Rielo Foundation; Cardinal Carlos Osoro, archbishop emeritus of Madrid; and prominent representatives of academic and cultural institutions.


This international prize has been held annually since 1981 and recognises works of poetry that express the intimate relationship of the human being with the divine. It is a literary reference in the field of contemporary mystical poetry.


The award-winning work: Exégesis


Exégesis, Andrea Rodríguez Prat's award-winning poetry collection, was selected by a jury composed of renowned scholars and writers such as Luis Alberto de Cuenca Prado, Tomás Albaladejo Mayordomo, David G. Murray and José Mª López Sevillano. The work won out of 312 entries from 32 countries, highlighting the universality and validity of mystical poetry.


The poetry book will be published shortly and proposes a lyrical journey through the Old and New Testaments, reflecting on the great antagonisms of human existence: light and shadow, grace and fall, eternity and the momentary. Rodríguez Prat addresses the mystery of a creature called to the light, but aware of its own shadow, culminating in a message of hope and reconciliation: “I am rich with the treasures / you have given me. / I do not see you / but I feel you in all things. / Yours, mine, / everything is the same. / The world is the embrace / of your presence.”


Mystical poetry, considered a literary expression in which the human meets the divine, recalls that the word has the power to transform silence into meaning and to open the human mind to the eternal. In essence, it is an act of listening and giving in which the transcendent is revealed through poetic expression.


Andrea Rodríguez Prat is the director of the Institute of Culture and Thought (CIP) at UIC Barcelona. The institution promotes interdisciplinary initiatives that invite critical reflection on the great questions of humanity.


“Receiving this award is a recognition not only of my career, but also of the power of poetry as a tool for dialogue and transformation. In such a fragmented world, we need poetry to reconcile ourselves with our humanity and with the divine,” said Rodríguez Prat.