HIGHEST PRAISE FOR POET
Uruguayan poet Ida Vitale on Tuesday was awarded the Cervantes Prize, the highest honor for literature in Spanish. At 95, Vitale is the last survivor of the so-called Generation of 45, a group of mainly Uruguayan writers who launched influential careers in the 1940s. The jury described her work as “intellectual and popular, universal and personal, transparent and profound.” She is the fifth woman to receive the prize, which is worth $140,000 and awarded every April 23 in the birthplace of the author of “Don Quixote,” Miguel de Cervantes. Spain’s King Felipe, rear left, was among those attending the ceremony.