New talents outnumber former winners at 65th Palanca Awards

New talents outnumbered the veterans on the list of winners at the Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards (CPMA) this year.

According to CPMA's Criselda Cecilio-Palanca, 33 of the 57 winners this year are first-time awardees. This includes the Grand Prize winners for the Novel and Nobela categories, which is given only every other year.

READ: The full list of this year's Palanca Award winners  

"We have winners of the Grand Prize for the Novel and the Nobela, which as you know are now given every two years. Both are first-time winners. Both are women. The winner in the English Division is only 32 years old—while the winner in the Filipino Division is all of 20," she said.

She was referring to Victorette Joy Z. Campilan, who won for her novel "All My Lonely Islands," and Charmaine Mercader Lasar, who wrote "Toto O."

With younger people winning the awards, Palanca added, the body is expecting to receive quality writing for decades to come.

"With the priceless gifts of observation and imagination, you writers wield language that becomes part of positive growth, of nation-building itself," she said.

Over the years, the Palanca Awards has awarded 2,200 authors of 2,278 winning works. Moreover, 25 have been elevated to the Palanca Hall of Fame for winning five first prizes each.

No Hall of Famer was named this year.

National Artist for Literature F. Sionil Jose, Budget Secretary Butch Abad, and Gawad Dangal ng Lahi recipient Gemino H. Abad were also at the event. Actor and director Ricky Davao acted as the night's master of ceremonies.  

Earlier this year, CPMA revised its rules after receiving backlash from the literary community.

Palanca winner Alma Anonas-Carpio, in an open letter, had pointed out that new rules the CPMA had set were problematic, particularly those on contestants' waiving all moral rights to their work in favor of the sponsor.

In a statement, CPMA director general Sylvia Quirino said that the parts that include "moral rights" of the entries and its retroactivity to past winning works have been deleted. — BM, GMA News