Award: Argentine writer Adolfo Bioy Casares on...

Award: Argentine writer Adolfo Bioy Casares on Thursday was awarded the 15th Miguel de Cervantes Prize, considered the Nobel prize of literature in Spanish. “I am overwhelmed with happiness and a bit flustered,” the 76-year-old Bioy Casares said in Madrid. “Literature has been the most important part of my life.” The award includes a $129,000 prize. Bioy Casares first won acclaim for his novel “The Invention of Morel,” which formed the basis for Alain Robbe-Grillet’s film “Last Year at Marienbad.”

Numbers: Prince Charles of Britain celebrated his 42nd birthday Wednesday in Tokyo by urging Japanese business leaders to apply their acumen to saving the world’s environment. Charles was in Japan for the enthronement of Emperor Akihito . . . . British odds makers are going against Michael Heseltine’s run to unseat Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher’s leadership of the ruling Conservative Party. The odds on Thatcher are 1-2 and 7-4 on Heseltine.

Hit the Beach: Mickey Spillane has written a mystery for South Carolina troops in Saudi Arabia, and those who solve it can win free air travel or hotel accommodations back in the U.S. The fictional story, to be sent by fax, involves a former South Carolina beauty queen involved in a kidnaping. It is “just a way to keep the guys reminded” of home, said the author, a South Carolina resident.

No Bus Tours, Please: The last issue of the New York Law Journal was a hot seller because it contained the names and addresses of the 5,000-plus people who just passed the state bar exam. But those hoping to get the address of John F. Kennedy Jr. were disappointed because the Journal had honored his request to withhold his address for the sake of privacy. Kennedy, member of the Manhattan district attorney’s staff, recently passed the bar after failing on his first two tries.