I did not see the interview with Juana Dolores (El Prat de Llobregat, 1992) on the Xavier Graset program and I was terribly lazy to get it back. After seeing her, I must say that they were both very good in her role. Dolores, lacking and direct. Graset, dialogue and thorough, had enough patience, I think. A couple of days ago I read him a tweet in which he said that more has been written about the Catalan Requiem than about any of the published works of philosophy and thought. It is the world we live in, at the sound of a bugle.
I would like to comment on a couple of things. The first is the drift of a part of the literary creation in Catalan towards contemporary art. Another line arises from comparative literature studies. I think it’s fantastic that this happens. Instead of getting caught up in well-known ideas and approved styles, Catalan literature is looking for new paths. Given the country and the readers we have, it seems like a miracle. But contemporary art has some unwritten laws that, when transferred to literature, cause the phenomenon we are experiencing: rather opaque books, with little communicative capacity, accompanied by theories adorned with big names. The idea that the artist is much more intelligent than the spectators, in this case, than the readers. Which puts him in a position of superiority – intellectually and, sometimes, morally. This breaks what we could call the pact between author and reader that has been maintained since the Renaixença, based on a correspondence of interests.
The other aspect that caught my attention in the interview with Més 324 and the reading of the Requiem is the reference to spirits. In a highly acclaimed novel of this moment we also find protagonist spirits. The concrete people disappear from the books replaced by shadows, presences of a world that never came to be, abstract essences, remorse. “There are treasures on the mountain tops and a word under the lake. Would you disobey the hints of the clouds? Would you disobey the hints of a ray of sunshine? “It’s a well-known song.
The book that has caused such a great scandal is the script for a piece of cultured music. Juana Dolores has written the text and Marc Migó, who commissioned, the music. Migó is also the author of the long text that in the book published by Edicions Poncianes (which this week reaches its second edition) explains the operation. He reminded me of Tom Wolfe’s idea in The Painted Word when he said that museums should exhibit theories and place the works next to them, the size of a cartouche. It also includes a series of photographs, Paisatges sobirans. A birth is not imaginary, it is imagined, under the artistic direction of Rosa Tharrats, with the intervention of several collaborators. Dolores acts, in vedette. There are good ones and others that are a little laughable. A few years ago, at the Sant Jordi award evening, Miriam Tey appeared in a dress with four bars, sewn by Ágatha Ruiz de la Prada. Years ago, too, Carles Pazos published a collage of Snowflake with the Virgin of Montserrat on her lap. Tharrats has painted the four bars on the naked body of Dolores with the Virgin of Montserrat in her hands, in a comic synthesis. She was good in the interview when she said that those photos of the four painted bars are the ones she likes the least because they are so obvious.
The Requiem is a text full of strength and bad luck, sometimes somewhat schematic. I suppose that this schematism is due, in good part, to the fact that it is a work to be interpreted or sung. A manifestation of justified rage that manifests itself in an esoteric and modern way. We’ve given up the shield and spear in favor of streamers, confetti, and good feelings. Catalonia has not managed to be a diamond: it is a teetotal nation, dispossessed of seduction, hyper-narcissistic. Against this soft and comfortable Catalonia (one of the many that exist), Juana Dolores raises her spell.
