Spanish literature prize goes to 94-year-old 15-M protestors' role model

It takes two 90-year-old men to show the doubters that the protests across Spain and Europe are not just young people complaining.

A 94-year-old writer, economist and humanist...José Luis Sampedro is this year's winner of the National Literature Prize because of his defense of a "more human, more caring economy that is able to help develop people's dignity."

Sampedro, who says the terms "productivity, competitiveness and innovation" should be replaced with "distribution, cooperation and recreation," has turned into an intellectual and moral role model for the members of the 15-M movement (which inspired Occupy Wall Street and other social protests across the globe). The nonagenarian author and thinker gained recent notoriety among a younger audience by writing the foreword for the now-famous protest essay, Time for Outrage! by [Nazi concentration-camp survivor] Stéphane Hessel, also 94 years old.

[Photo of José Luis Sampedro by ULY MARTÍN, El País.]