The winners of the 2024 Taiwan Literature Awards for Original Works received trophies Aug. 3 at the National Museum of Taiwan Literature in southern Taiwan’s Tainan City, following the winners’ announcement last month, according to the Ministry of Culture.
The main awards categories include the Drama Award and Mother Tongue Literature Awards for Indigenous languages, Taiwanese, and Hakka, the MOC said. The Drama Award went to Huang Wan-ting, whose work criticizes modernity and Taiwan’s Europe-centered global perspective.
For the Taiwanese category, Wei Chung-yi clinched the top prize for a novel, the MOC said, adding that his work depicts older generation rural characters and explores economic and social challenges faced by young people. Lin Hsiu-jung and Lin Ken-hui were awarded the top prize for new poetry and prose, respectively.
In the Hakka category, Wu Yu-hao took the top prize for a novel with his work discussing decreasing birth rates and an aging population; while Chiu Hsiang-yun and He Chih-ming won in the new poetry and prose categories, respectively. The winning novel by Pan Chen-yu in Indigenous languages was recognized by judges as a landmark work, while the first prizes for new poetry and prose went to Lin Cheng and Lidur Walis, respectively, the ministry added.
Deputy Culture Minister Lee Ching-hwi said during the presentation ceremony that the awards for original works have drawn public attention to using mother tongues in literature, helping to preserve the country’s cultural heritage. She further shared her recent experience in attending an Author’s Reading Month in the Czech Republic, when she was moved by listening to Taiwan authors reading in their mother languages during the event.
According to the NMTL, TLA pays tribute to Taiwan’s outstanding literary work, encourages the creation of original content and highlights Taiwan’s values while raising its literary profile in the global community. (YCH-E)
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