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Guest of honor: Catalonian culture
A doorway to Europe
Catalonia and the Balearic Islands has traditionally
been Spain's doorway to Europe and the Mediterranean. Located to
the northeast of the Iberian Peninsula, they extend over a territory
of more than 37,000 square kilometers, with 2,000 kilometers of
coastline. Its geography has encouraged the settlement of many peoples
and cultures through history and helped develop a long tradition
of trade and exchange with neighboring lands. More than seven million
people now live in Catalonia and the Balearic Islands.
Mallorca, Menorca, Ibiza and Formentera are the
four Balearic Islands. Their benign climate, the beauty of their
shores, and their rugged and mountainous inlands enticed many civilizations-among
them, the Phoenicians, Romans, and Moors. At the same time, more
than 10 million tourists visit annually, constituting the main driving
economic force of the Balearic Islands.
Catalonia shares with the Balearic Islands a rich
history, a common tongue, and a culture turned towards the Mediterranean.
Barcelona, its capital, is one of the great cities of Europe, as
well as a cultural and economic center that has hosted the 1929
World's Fair, the 1992 Summer Olympics and the 2004 World Culture
Forum.
A distinct element of Catalonian culture is Catalan,
which together with Spanish, French, Italian, and Portuguese, constitutes
the most important of the Romance languages. It is spoken by more
than 7 million people, not only in Catalonia and the Balearic Islands,
but also in the Autonomous Province of Valencia, in Andorra, and
in southern France. Catalan is currently taught in 135 universities
around the world, including Mexico, and in 50 Catalonian centers
or casals outside Catalonia, primarily in Latin America.
Renowned cultural
ambassadors
Who has not heard of artists such as Miró,
Dalí, Tàpies, or Barceló; architects such as
Gaudí, Sert, or Bofill; composers like Albéniz, Granados,
or Montsalvage; performers such as Pau Casals, Montserrat Caballé,
Josep Carreras, Jordi Savall; theatrical troupes such as Els Comediants,
or La Fura dels Baus; designers like Mariscal, chefs such as Ferran
Adrià, or singer/composers like Joan Manuel Serrat? This
is but a small sample of the vigor and the diversity of contemporary
Catalonian culture, one of the oldest cultures in Europe, dating
back at least to the twelfth century A. D., when the sermon book
Les Homilies d'Organyà, one of the earliest known texts in
Catalan (whose eighth centennial is commemorated this year), was
written.
Since then and up to the present, one of the richest
literary traditions in Europe has developed in Catalan, including
some especially splendid periods such as the Middle Ages, with the
philosopher and mystic Ramón Llull and the poet Ausiàs
March, as well as Joanot Martorell, the writer of Tirant lo Blanc,
considered by Mario Vargas Llosa as the first modern novel in Western
literature. Under the influence of the Renaixença ("Renaissance")
of the middle nineteenth century, a movement parallel to Romanticism
in the rest of Europe, Catalonian society rediscovered itself socially
and politically; it produced a veritable explosion of creativity
in every field of culture and the arts, with poet Verdaguer and
master architect Gaudí as its greatest figures.
During the twentieth century two profound literary
traditions collided and influenced one another. One was Catalonian
literature, with writers such as Josep Pla, Mercè Rodoreda,
Llorenç Villalonga, Pere Calders, Baltasar Porcel, Carme
Riera, Jesús Moncada, and Quim Monzó, and poets such
as Josep Carner, J. V. Foix, Carles Riba, Salvador Espriu, Gabriel
Ferrater, Pere Gimferrer, and Ramón Xirau. The other was
Spanish literature written by Catalonian authors, such as writers
Juan Marsé, Juan and Luis Goytisolo, Eduardo Mendoza and
Enrique Vila-Matas, and poets like Jaime Gil de Biedma, Carlos Barral
and José Agustín Goytisolo.
Barcelona, the publishing
capital
Barcelona is the traditional capital of the publishing
industry in Spain, maintaining close links with Mexico. The history
of Catalonian publishing harks back to the beginnings of the printing
press, and it lives on in the oldest publishing house in the world:
Publicacions de l'Abadía de Montserrat, founded in 1499.
Publishing thrived in Barcelona throughout the nineteenth century.
It went through a severe crisis in the first years of Francisco
Franco's dictatorship, but recovered its vitality in the 1970's.
The relationship between Catalonian publishers
and Latin America is powerful and productive. Currently, 38% of
all the Spanish books exported to Mexico come from Catalonia, which,
in turn, produces 52% of all the books exported by Spain. Many of
the largest Spanish publishing houses—the Planeta Group, Océano,
Paidós, Anagrama, Tusquets, and Gustavo Gili—are from Catalonia.
There are also Mexican publishers of Catalonian descent, many of
whom came to Mexico during the Spanish Civil War.
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