From Mr S. Grech

The National Book Council would like to thank Marie Benôit for being one of the few to actually mention the National Book Prize in her column, albeit negatively.

In her piece she talks about Karl Schembri not getting one of the prizes for his book Il-Manifest tal-Killer. A fact attributed by Ms Benôit and Mr Schembri to the fact that there was a priest and an ex-priest among the three judges of that section.

It is amazing how much foot stamping a person who loses a prize is likely to do, and how many aspersions he will cast in order to be able to achieve closure. That is, that it was everybody else’s fault he did not get first or second prize in this prestigious national competition.

We are quite unhappy that a writer of Karl Schembri’s calibre should be behaving in such an immature manner, particularly since we believe him to be one of Malta’s more innovative and reformative writers of the present age. I am afraid his actions in the wake of his not winning a prize for his book do little to support that image.

The National Book Prize is inclusive. It is inclusive also in its choice of judges. I am surprised that we still look at a person’s vocation, rather than at his or her abilities in this day and age – that we still label and stereotype for the sake of making our point, no matter how personal it is. Fr Norbert Ellul Vincenti was chosen as a judge for that particular section because he is eminently qualified as a judge – extremely open-minded and has proved himself an able critic both in the past and now. The same can be said for George Peresso, whose excellent literary qualifications need not be repeated here.

Perhaps it would be an eye-opener for Mr Schembri (who has been spreading the communication Ms Benôit also must have got, because the words in her diary closely mirrored the angry mail he sent to the chairman of the National Book Council, to all and sundry... a possible cry for help and exculpation) to know that the priest on the jury gave him the highest mark of the three judges for that section, a total of 87 from a potential 100, and that Il-Manifest tal-Killer came third in the section for which it was submitted.

Then again, given the ranting and raging, are we to believe that Mr Schembri thinks his book better than those that came first and second? Most probably that is the case, and he cannot bring himself to think that it might be otherwise. That is if he is thinking at all as he stampedes all over the place trying to find a reason why he did not go home with the prize.

I do suppose that there is something to be said about immaturity feeding art, but turning the whole charade into a national debacle demands that friends of his, like Ms Benôit, give him a helping hand. I hope your readers will understand exactly where the fault, if there is fault, lies.

Sergio Grech

Executive Director

National Book Council