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Peter Bush, winner of the Ramon Llull Prize for Literary Translation, brings to English this most prolific and influential of Catalan writers.
Dripping with a panache that can turn in a comic instant to the most conciliatory humility, Josep Pla's foray into the land and sea most familiar to him will plunge readers head-first into its mysterious (and often tasty!) depths. Here are adventures and shipwrecks, raspy storytellers and the fishy meals that sustain them.
After describing the process of beating an octopus with branches to soften up its flesh, Pla writes, "These are dishes that must be seen as a last resort." Pla inflects the mundane with the hidden rhythms of power sculpting culture, so that a hot supper is never just food—it embodies economic precarity and environmental erosion along with its own peculiar flavor.
A lifetime of reporting on current events gave Pla the necessary skills to describe the world in all its gritty, funny, invigorating detail.
About the Author
Pla (1897-1981) was a Catalan writer and journalist who lived in Spain, France, Italy, England, Germany, and Russia. He was awarded The Gold Medal of the Autonomous Government of Catalonia for his contribution to Catalan literature. His complete works are published in thirty-eight volumes
Industry Reviews
"The grand old man of Catalan letters and one of Spain's most prolific writers."
Chicago Tribune
"Josep Pla has long been considered one of the finest writers of autobiographical texts in any of the languages of Spain."
Hispanic Review
"Considered one of the most influential Catalan authors of the twentieth century, [Pla] was born and raised in the Emporda, and over the course of his life wrote over 30,000 pages of prose in which he diligently catalogued the landscape and the life and habits of the people of the region. His complete works, published and republished over the years, contain marvelous descriptive passages that capture the landscape's history and its complex topography at once."
Words Without Borders
"Josep Pla was a great noticer of things and places; his gaze was alert and dry; he wrote in a style which registered both the smallest detail and the large picture. His relationship to Catalan identity and Spanish history was complex, often ambiguous. His relationship, however, to the scene in front of him, or the days in which he lived, remains fascinating for its clarity, its sharpness, its originality and its wit. On display in his work is a glittering and sparkling sensibility."
Colm Toibin
Chicago Tribune
"Josep Pla has long been considered one of the finest writers of autobiographical texts in any of the languages of Spain."
Hispanic Review
"Considered one of the most influential Catalan authors of the twentieth century, [Pla] was born and raised in the Emporda, and over the course of his life wrote over 30,000 pages of prose in which he diligently catalogued the landscape and the life and habits of the people of the region. His complete works, published and republished over the years, contain marvelous descriptive passages that capture the landscape's history and its complex topography at once."
Words Without Borders
"Josep Pla was a great noticer of things and places; his gaze was alert and dry; he wrote in a style which registered both the smallest detail and the large picture. His relationship to Catalan identity and Spanish history was complex, often ambiguous. His relationship, however, to the scene in front of him, or the days in which he lived, remains fascinating for its clarity, its sharpness, its originality and its wit. On display in his work is a glittering and sparkling sensibility."
Colm Toibin
ISBN: 9781939810724
ISBN-10: 1939810728
Published: 1st December 2020
Format: Paperback
Language: English
Number of Pages: 310
Audience: General Adult
Publisher: RANDOM HOUSE US
Country of Publication: US
Dimensions (cm): 19.0 x 15.3 x 3.2
Weight (kg): 0.64
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