Lídia Jorge wins 2026 Camões Prize

The honour comes a year after she was invited by the President of the Republic to address Portugal Day, following major awards in France and Austria. One year after being chosen to deliver the Portugal Day address, Portuguese writer Lídia Jorge, one of the country’s leading contemporary literary figures, has received the highest distinction awarded to authors writing in Portuguese, the Camões Prize. Jorge thus succeeds Angolan poet Ana Paula Tavares, who was honoured with the prize last year. Born in Tavira in 1946, Lídia Jorge has built up a body of work of more than a dozen titles, mainly novels, beginning in 1979 with the publication of O Dia dos Prodígios. Her most recent novel, Misericórdia, published in 2022, is largely autofiction, based on her experience with her mother, who fell victim to the Covid-19 pandemic while in a care home. Misericórdia has received several honours in Portugal and also won France’s prestigious Prix Médicis Étranger. Earlier this year, the author received the Austrian State Prize for European Literature for her body of work. The Camões Prize is jointly awarded by Portugal and Brazil and is organised by Portugal’s Ministry of Culture together with Brazil’s National Library Foundation.