Paradise exists, that is well known to those who know certain hidden corners of the Costa Brava. One of them is the Sanià estate that the businessman and leader of the CEOE and the COE Carlos Ferrer Salat bought in 1973. A beautiful and austere white house dominates a spectacular cliff and a cove among pine trees, close to the Castell beach.
In that building and in a nearby cabin, both completely rehabilitated and renovated, they will be able to reside, be inspired and write at their leisure and in peace for a month, in shifts of four, authors from all over the world, fully invited by the Finestres Foundation.
This Literary Residency experience with its own space has precedents in countries such as the US – among others, the famous Ledig House – Italy and Germany, with a long tradition of cultural patronage, but it hardly has similar initiatives in Spain: let’s point out the Antonio Foundation Córdoba Gala or, on a smaller scale, the Faber of the Ramon Llull Institute, in a hotel in Olot.
The promoter of the one inaugurated on the Costa Brava is the businessman Sergi Ferrer-Salat, who the day before yesterday explained its purpose on the spot.
Current owner of the pharmaceutical group Ferrer Internacional, which employs nearly 2,000 people and has Gelocatil among its products, he practices “systemic and transformative” philanthropy, in his words, dedicating 50% of the company’s profits to projects patronage: the Ferrer-Salat Musical Foundation; a nutrition and sustainability area that serves 4,200 meals a day to people in need through 53 Catalan centers, from its own organic crops; and the Finestres Foundation, for literary topics.
Ferrer-Salat is a good reader, he believes in the “infinite” transformative power of reading – he already explained it at the Edita 2021 Forum – and the day before yesterday, in his presentation, he referred to the impact that critical thinking works such as Silent Spring had on his training. , by Rachel Carson, the essays of Noam Chomsky, and his current interest in authors such as Thomas Piketty.
“For me the book has always been a source of infinite inspiration to become aware,” he said. “Awareness of the luck that some of us have had to be born where we were born, in a privileged family and social environment, and of our dependence on a nature that we are incapable of respecting.”
He considers that “to correct the imbalances caused by predatory neoliberalism, the solution is a more equitable distribution of wealth.”
Ferrer-Salat took the name of his literary foundation (in Catalan, “windows”) from a quote by Julien Green: “A book is a window through which one escapes.” But although it has not been taken into account, José or Josep Finestres was also a professor at the University of Cervera; a Catalan humanist from the 18th century with very universal interests whose reference is not superfluous either.
Fundación Finestres already has two reference bookstores on calle Diputació and next year it will open a new one in Palamós, where the old Gavina bookstore was.
Consistent with his own postulates, Ferrer-Salat also decided to open the family farm, where he spent many summers during his childhood and today it is his property, “but it was very little used,” to the creators.
The Colombian Nicolás Botero, with Italian experience alongside Countess Beatrice von Rezzori, at the Santa Maddalena Foundation, is in charge of directing its operation.
The selected authors – through an open call, Finestres scholarships and awards or by direct invitation, in addition to being able to cultivate “imagination, thought and cultural exchange”, will enjoy the menus, “prepared in a healthy and balanced way” by chef Ariadna Julián.
A team of five people is in charge of the day-to-day running of this white construction, which those in charge equate to “a blank page.”
During the trial period, Irene Solà, Marcos Giralt Torrente, Gabriel Ventura, Leila Guerriero and Elif Batuman have passed through there, and Mariana Enriquez, Kae Tempest and Irene Pujades, among others, will soon do so.
This house built in the 1930s was one of the three enclaves on the Costa Brava that hosted Truman Capote when he was writing In Cold Blood (a stay recreated by Màrius Carol in his novel The Man in the Silk Pajamas), and joins the mythology of an area that also includes the famous Mas Juny by Josep Maria Sert.
Yes, Paradise -literary- exists, and is now within the reach of forty-four lucky creators per year, whom we already envy in advance.
