Krivec said on the occasion that literary criticism was disappearing from traditional and online media, as their limited sources of financing forces them to stick to certain rules and offer a limited selection of texts.

"The media control how these texts will look, leading to criticism being banished and replaced by PR texts written at the time of the literary work's distribution and acting as criticism," Krivec told the STA.

He also warned about several free criticism appearing online. "It is a dangerous place, as it fosters a hierarchy which we do not yet understand and is spearheaded by populism and accessibility."

Krivec sees several solutions for maintaining literary criticism. One is to bring it closer to the people, while the other is to persist in writing criticism which may not be understood by everyone, but still make room for reflection and turn out to be important in retrospect.

Nevertheless, this year's Stritar Prize laureate remains optimistic. "We know stories from the history of media about a newspaper disappearing and a new one taking its place. The current situation is what it is, but let's not lose hope for the future."

The Stritar Prize, worth EUR 1,000, is named after author Josip Stritar (1836-1923), who laid the foundations of the Slovenian literary criticism.

It has been conferred by the Slovenian Writers' Association as part of the Pranger festival since 2013. Last year, it went to critic Tanja Petrič.