Leonard Cohen Awarded Spain's Prince of Asturias Award

Crooner, poet and eternal hipster Leonard Cohen, age 76, has consistently won the hearts of each new generation but, on Wednesday, he also won Spain's prestigious Prince of Asturias Award for Letters, largely due to his use of "emotional imagery in which poetry and music are fused in an oeuvre of immutable merit." Cohen was chosen from an elite pool of 32 candidates, including English novelist Ian McEwan ('Solar,' 'Black Dogs') and Canadian writer Alice Munro ('Runaway,' 'Too Much Happiness').

The Prince of Asturias Foundation writes that Cohen's "poems and songs have beautifully explored the major issues of humanity in great depth." Well, duh. The prize is one of eight annual honors that the foundation awards each year, for excellence in various disciplines.

Of course, this isn't Cohen's first accolade. He's an Officer and Companion of the Order of Canada, a member of the Rock 'n' Roll Hall of Fame and a 2010 recipient of the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award.

Cohen -- who is recognized as an influential poet and author as well as a singer-songwriter -- made one of his many, periodic "comebacks" the past few years with a critically-acclaimed, worldwide tour, and he is said to be at work on his first new studio album in seven years. Good -- we've been waiting. In the meantime, maybe we can just, you know, give him more awards and talk about how great he is.