Don’t give up is the mantra. A downpour has just fallen in Barcelona’s Eixample, but, be careful, the weather report says that at 6:45 p.m., in 20 minutes, it will no longer rain. And that is just the time when 14 authors with a book this Sant Jordi have an appointment with the team of La Vanguardia photographers on the roof of the Alma hotel to be the protagonists of the Book Day cover…
When you leave the elevator, on the seventh and last floor, there are two sofas and the Perico Pastor macrorose that the painter has gladly provided as the background for this iconic annual image. The rain subsides, only four drops fall, but it is better not to rush and wait to take out the set as soon as all the authors have entered the hotel.
-You mean? Wouldn’t it be better to go to plan b and set up the photo in the restaurant?
But Xavier Cervera is resilient until the end. He is not daunted by the risk of another unexpected downpour catching everyone in the middle of their work. The cloudy light will be magnificent, the background with the Sagrada Família is dreamlike… you have to trust.
And so begin the elevator rides with the authors and their editors. Hernán Díaz, the Argentine Pulitzer who has starred in a hit with Fortuna, says he is very honored. He finds it almost as incredible as Dua Lipa declaring herself a fan of his and wanting to interview him on streaming. “You have to be happy, I am just an object in this situation, and I am also very docile,” he says about the photographic task.
Eduardo Mendoza, however, refuses to take his coat in case it gets cold. “Ah, no, I already know how to say no to photographers. If it’s cold, I’ll go,” says the veteran novelist with half a century of Sant Jordis behind him. His new novel, Three Enigmas for the Organization is a detective parody that places – coincidence, eh – the detective agency near this hotel where the La Vanguardia literary festival is held annually. You are promised it will be painless, in no time, before heaven thinks twice. But heaven doesn’t take long to think about it. And it’s for the worse.
When Mendoza takes the last elevator to the caldazo, seven floors up, a dozen authors with their respective literary agents crowd in the corridor that connects the terraces. And when the elevator doors open, what you see is a new curtain of water…
Everybody down!
The elevator anecdote is not enough for a novel. Mendoza, for example, does not see it. But he has been worth a few laughs. And Californian Bonnie Garmus (short for the complex Polish name of an ancestor) takes it as part of the Barcelona adventure. “I am delighted to be in Barcelona.” She says it with that American smile that she has dreamed of in the city since the Olympic Games. from 1992. “Being at a literary party is not at all what I had imagined. It’s amazing to connect with so many readers, especially for me, who didn’t think anyone would even publish my book. And even less so that people from all over the world connected in the same way with the story. “That shows that we have a lot in common and that everyone wants change.”
He says it because of the bombshell of his Chemistry Lessons, a novel about a chemist who in the fifties is fired from the laboratory and ends up presenting a cooking show… “I just wanted a character who would appear on television and, at that time , the only way for a woman to appear on camera was to either be number two or talk about something related to housework. So I decided to talk about cooking. By the way… did you know that there is a conference in Barcelona in November about chemistry and cooking?
The conversation takes place at the time when the material for the photo descends from the roof… The velvet sofas that the hotel lent for the set have barely escaped the rain; Perico Pastor’s painting is lucky to be acrylic; the cameras arrive drier than the photographers’ backs… In five minutes you have to execute plan b in the restaurant, with the garden in the background. Elisa Victoria, author of Otaberra, offers to appear sitting on the floor, in front of the sofas, at the feet of the stellar Hernán Díaz, but she chooses to maintain an elegant tone. Sitting next to Garmus, Pablo d’Ors ends up giving his place to Mendoza, who insisted on standing on the side. Regina Rodríguez Sirvent lives with the Barcelona writer a fan moment like last year with Juana Dolores and Pedro Almodóvar… “You don’t know what it is like for me to meet him in person, since I was little Eduardo Mendoza’s books were always present” .
Carme Riera raises the glass next to Javier Gomá (who only brings three books this Sant Jordi) while behind Ramon Gener and César Pérez Gellida smile. The shooting seemed impossible, but there they are… María Belmonte, Roberto Corral, Sergi Pàmies and Eva Baltasar smiling…
