Lara Calleja
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Lara Calleja | |
|---|---|
| Born | August 20, 1988 |
| Notable awards | 2021 EU Prize for Literature |
Lara Calleja (born 20 August 1988) is a Maltese novelist and playwright.[1]
She was raised in the village of Marsaskala.[2] She attended a Catholic secondary school[3] and studied Near Eastern studies at university,[2] graduating with honors in 2010.[4] After graduating, Calleja worked part-time as a librarian for six years.[4] In 2020, she quit a career in tourism to become a freelance writer and translator.[4]
Calleja has been involved in political activism since she was 16.[2] She has joined the activist organization Moviment Graffitti.[5] She has congenital myasthenia gravis, which "causes weaknesses in her facial features and arms".[6]
Writing career
Calleja has cited Immanuel Mifsud as her "wake-up call" to Maltese literature, encountering his work when she was 17. Mifsud later met Calleja, and encouraged her to continue writing.[5]
Her debut novel, Lucy Min?, was published in 2016 and was nominated for the Maltese National Book Prize.[7] The work is a coming-of-age novel following the titular Lucy.[8] Miriam Calleja, for the Times of Malta, noted of the work, "Calleja has set out to write what some would consider unwritable: the dark, not-so-polite thoughts, the anonymous one-night-stands, and the downright awkwardness that might be distinctively Maltese".[8]
She began writing her second book, the short story anthology Kissirtu Kullimkien (You Have Destroyed Everything), in 2016; it was published in 2020.[3] The work won the National Book Prize for new writers.[2] The book also won the 2021 EU Prize for Literature, making her the first Maltese women to win the award.[9]
Many of Calleja's stories contain political elements,[1] as in her anthology, where many of the stories deal with over-construction,[5] and one which centers a "traumatised migrant".[10][3]
Calleja is also a playwright; her debut play Taralalla was staged at the Spazju Kreattiv venue in Valletta in late 2021.[3][4][11]
Calleja is also the founder and CEO of the speech-writing service Mil-Qalb.[12]
