Three Portuguese, three Mozambican and four Brazilian writers are among the finalists in the 19th edition of Oceanos - Portuguese Language Literature Award, created in Brazil, which annually chooses the best literary works published in Portuguese.

Alexandra Lucas Coelho with "Líbano, labirinto", Djaimilia Pereira de Almeida, with "Maremoto", and José Gardeazabal with "Quarentena - Uma história de amor", represent Portugal among this year's finalists.

The Mozambican authors selected for the final phase of Oceanos are João Paulo Borges Coelho, with "Museu da Revolução", Pedro Pereira Lopes with "O livro do homem líquido", and Teresa Noronha with "Tornado".

The list also includes Brazilian authors Micheliny Verunschk, who competes with "O som do roido da onça", Maria Fernanda Elias Maglio with "Quem tá vivo levanta a mão", Ana Martins Marques with "Risque esta palavra", and Tatiana Salem Levy with "Vista Chinesa".

According to Lusa, the Oceans organizers indicated that the authors of the 10 classified works will be invited to a series of events in Brazil, Mozambique, and Portugal.

The conversations will take place in three units of Livraria da Travessa, in São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro, in Brazil, and in Livraria Travessa in Lisbon, in Portugal, which will receive the Brazilian and Portuguese writers between the last week of November and the first week of December.

In Mozambique, the program will be held in Maputo, in a place to be defined. The calendar of these meetings will be announced on the Oceans Award social networks.

For the first time, the announcement of the winners will take place in Mozambique, a Portuguese-speaking country on the African continent.

The announcement of the winners will take place on December 9th, at 17:00 of Portugal and 18:00 of Maputo, in an event broadcasted in real time by Oceanos' YouTube.

A committee formed by cultural manager and Oceanos coordinator Selma Caetano, journalist and curator Isabel Lucas, and writer Luís Cardoso, winner of the Oceanos 2021 Award, is going to Mozambique to sign a Memorandum of Understanding with the Mozambican Ministry of Culture and Tourism.

With the consolidation of the partnership with Mozambique, closed in 2022, the organizers highlighted that the Oceans Award now has the direct collaboration of Cape Verde, Mozambique, and Portugal, in addition to the institutional cooperation of the Community of Portuguese Language Countries (CPLP).

With this, Oceanos is closer to its primary goal of having partners with all the CPLP member countries to reach the totality of Portuguese language literary production produced around the world.

In 2023, the Oceanos curatorial commission formed by representatives from Brazil, Cape Verde, Mozambique, and Portugal will propose changes to the award's regulations, seeking to materialize the cataloging of literature in Portuguese language that Oceanos Cultura has been carrying out since 2021.

This year, 2,452 titles from authors of 17 different nationalities, with works published in seven countries: Angola, Brazil, Cape Verde, United States, Guinea-Bissau, Mozambique, and Portugal, competed for Oceans.

The total value of the prize is 250 thousand reals (about 48 thousand euros at the current exchange rate), with 120 thousand reals (23.1 thousand euros) going to the first place winner, 80 thousand for the second (15 thousand euros) and 50 thousand for the third (9.6 thousand euros).

Oceanos is held through the Incentive to Culture Law, by the Special Secretariat of Culture of the Ministry of Tourism, and is sponsored by Banco Itaú and the Directorate-General of Books, Archives and Libraries of the Portuguese Republic; supported by Itaú Cultural, the Ministry of Culture and Creative Industries of Cape Verde, and the Portuguese Language Bibliographic Fund, as well as the institutional support of the CPLP.