Torres Wins National Literature Award

DJ DeLong
Creative writing and history major
College of Arts and Sciences, Marketing and Communication student employee

Benjamin Torres

Western Michigan University is known for being globally engaged through many different study abroad programs and partnerships with universities around the world, however, WMU faculty and staff are also from all over the world. Dr. Benjamin Torres, a professor of Spanish, is a part of the faculty that comes from outside of the United States. Torres has also received multiple awards for his research. The Institute of Puerto Rican Literature has recently awarded him with the National Literature Award, Third Prize in the category of Research and Criticism.

It's no surprise that Torres is interested in Caribbean literature. Originally born in Cuba, Torres and his family left in 1960 and eventually settled in Puerto Rico from the time he was eight years old. When reading the literary works by Edgardo Rodríguez Juliá, Torres found a clear and convincing explanation of why Puerto Rico is the way that it is culturally and politically. Torres says, "He explained Puerto Rico in a way no other writer had done before or has done since."

Torres has spent a large amount of time on his research and study of Rodríguez Juliá, including two book-length studies. The first, Para llegar a la Isla Verde de Edgardo Rodríguez Juliá, was published by the University of Puerto Rico Press in 2007 and was intended as a general introduction to the author’s work. His second, Iconografía: lo visual en la obra de Edgardo Rodríguez Juliá, concentrates on the presence of visual images, whether reproduced or verbally described. According to Torres, in order to comprehend the literary production of Rodríguez Juliá it is indispensable to understand the function of the visual in his work. 

Iconografía is the work for which Torres has received the National Literature Award.  Torres' publisher, Elizardo Martínez, entered his book in the Institute of Puerto Rican Literature’s literary competition. When asked about how he felt after receiving the award, Torres said, "I feel honored to receive this prize because my book competed with studies written by literary critics whom I read and admire."

This isn't Torres' first award, though. In 2013, he was awarded the College of Arts and Sciences Research Award for his substantial literary contributions to the field of Caribbean literature. Torres commented, "I would continue my research with or without an award, but it is very special to be nominated by one's colleagues."

In addition to the two books on literary criticism, Torres has published Gabriel García Márquez o la alquimia del incesto in 1987, has edited other works by Rodríguez Juliá, most notably La renuncia del héroe Baltasar in 2006, and made contributions to several other books on Caribbean literature.

When Torres isn't writing or doing research, he devotes his time and energy to teaching. He began teaching at WMU in the fall of 1990. This year he joins the 25 Year Club. The Master of Arts program in Spanish began that same year and the department has grown steadily. He says it has been great to be a part of that process and looks forward to watching what happens in the years to come. Torres encourages students to be passionate about any profession they are pursuing and wish to go in to. He continued by saying, "I love teaching and I enjoy reading literature and writing about it. If it is truly your vocation, you will be successful at what you do."