Essential Works of Catalan Literature
2009; University of Oklahoma; Volume: 83; Issue: 5 Linguagem: Inglês
10.1353/wlt.2009.0010
ISSN1945-8134
Autores Tópico(s)Early Modern Spanish Literature
Resumo3 Essential Works of Catalan Literature Ramon Llull,Doctor llluminatus: A Ramon Llull Reader, ed. Anthony Bon ner, tr. Anthony Bonner & Eve Bonner (Princeton University Press, 1994). Poet and novelist, philosopher and theologian, the Mallorcan Ramon Llull (1232-1316) was the firstgreat writer in theCatalan language. This selection of his works contains his celebrated mystical text,The Book of theLover and theBeloved. Ausi?s March, Verse Translations of Thirty Poems, ed. & tr. Robert Archer (Tamesis,2006). The fifteenth-century Valencian poet March developed a distinc tivepsychological stylemodeled on Petrarch's poetry. These translations with theCatalan texts enface avoid March's rhyme schemes but evoke analogous meters. Joanot Martorell, Tirant lo Blanc, ed. & tr.David H. Rosenthal(Johns Hopkins University Press, 1996). An abridged but livelyversion of the chivalric romance by theValencian knightMartorell. First published in 1490, the prose text is characterized by a grittyrealism, at times grim, at others ironic, that influenced Cer vantes' Don Quixote. Jacint Verdaguer, Selected Poems: A Bilingual Edition, ed. & tr. Ronald Puppo (University of Chicago Press, 2007). The leading figure in thenineteenth century Catalan renaissance, Verda guer wrote poems on both sacred and secular themes, mixing Chris tian belief with Catalan nationalism. These translations seek to re-create Verdaguer's stanzaic structures. Merce Rodoreda, The Time of the Doves, tr. David H. Rosenthal (1962; Eng.Graywolf,1986). Although the title romanticizes Rodoreda's stream-of-consciousness novel, La plaga del diamant, the trans lation releases its emotional power. This tragic tale of a working-class woman during the Spanish Civil War is perhaps themost important work of modern Catalan fiction. Gabriel Ferrater, Women and Days: Selected Poems, tr. Arthur Terry (Arc, 2004). Ferrater's reflective, autobiographi cal verse, gathered in 1968 a few years before his death, exerted an enormous influence on Catalan poetry for the rest of the twentieth century and beyond. This bilingual selection is translated by theBritish doyen ofCatalan literarystudies. Literary History& Criticism Arthur Terry's A Companion to Cata lan Literature (Tamesis, 2003) offers a comprehensive survey from its beginnings to the twenty-first cen tury, drawing useful distinctions and tracing dominant trends. Cata lonian literature, whether written inCatalan or in Spanish, has been affectedby a profoundly nationalist investment in theCatalan language since the end of Franco's dictator ship in 1975 and the reemergence of an autonomous government in the region. Kathryn Crameri has explored this vernacular nationalism in two books: Language, the Novelist and National Identity in Post-Franco Catalonia (Legenda, 2000) and Catalo nia:National Identity andCultural Pol icy,1980-2003 (University ofWales Press, 2008). Joan Ramon Resina's Ausi?s March Verse translations of thirty poems controversial study, Barcelona's Voca tionof Modernity: Rise and Decline of an Urban Image (Stanford Univer sity Press, 2008), uses literary works to chart the changing cultural and social significance of thecity. Compiled byLawrenceVenuti 6o i World Literature Today ...
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