When a traumatic event crosses Mercè's innocent youth, she has no choice but to leave everything, flee and start over far from her origins and family. This is the life story of the protagonist of Canviar de pell (La Magrana), but it could be that of thousands of women who have had to cross borders to remake themselves and their loved ones. The literary debut of the Catalan Aina Gatnau (L'Alzina, 1986) is an intimate story of self-improvement set between the Lleida region of La Noguera and Paris, with the Spanish postwar period as a backdrop.
At the same time, it is a novel composed of multiple brief scenes that reveal the protagonist's confessions in her diary, the sisterhood between the female characters, central to the novel, and the glamorous atmosphere of Parisian fashion. "Mercè can be you, me, your grandmother or your aunt," says the author in an interview with La Vanguardia. "Her story of her doesn't exist, it's fiction, but it's inspired by all women," she adds.
With the book, Gatnau wanted to "make visible the history of people who have had to make their lives, especially women." "It seems that women have been made to live in a low voice," she says. This is the case of Mercè, but also that of her sister-in-law Cecília de ella, whom the protagonist has as a reference for her. In reality, she is the only one who holds out her hand to Mercè and helps her escape from her after that traumatic episode that makes her grow up suddenly, despite the fact that later the physical distance causes them to never know anything of each other again. the other.
About this relationship, the writer states that "a sister-in-law is not a blood brother but is part of your house, your family and your tribe." "I thought it was nice to explore the relationship between women. I like to say that in my novel there are guardian angels and demons," she continues. And, without a doubt, Cecília is an angel for Mercè. "She is a person who understands her because she lives in the same landscape as her," notes the author.
In fact, the environment that surrounds the characters is almost one of the novel. In the first place, La Noguera, as an example of a reclusive and oppressive Spanish society. Placing the first part of his debut work in his birthplace, Gatnau intended to "give visibility to the rural world, which perhaps with the pandemic has been revalued, but until now it was the periphery." "It was difficult for me to write about this because I thought that the rural world does not have readers, but it is to make other realities visible", she confesses.
Thus, the author drinks from all the anecdotes that her grandparents have told her so many times. "It is the oral memory that is passed from grandparents to grandchildren," she explains. And, once again returning to her autobiographical component, Gatnau declares that "it's fiction, but I've been to all the places I'm talking about, because if I haven't been there I can't write."
Beyond Catalonia, to "change her skin" the protagonist travels to the French capital, thus retracing a journey that many others before her did, fleeing the consequences of the Civil War. "I chose it because many people followed this path, to make it visible and to pay it a bit of homage," she says. "It is very brave to leave home and not know what you are going to find. In addition, this route is very relevant right now," says the writer, referring to Ukraine and many other current conflicts.
Canviar de pell takes place like a diary to which Mercè confesses all her thoughts, giving the work a visual and sensory style. As for the format, it is because the protagonist "is born in a society where her voice is not important or is not heard." "With her pen no one will veto her, she emerges as a way of having her own voice," Gatnau details. The language, very dialogue, responds to the desire to "establish a link with the reader, is more confident."
Along the same lines, the author maintains that it is also "a vindication of the rich oral language that we have, which does not have to be artificial." "It aims to be a minimalist, spoken and close novel," she continues. According to the writer, "the readers of 200 years ago perhaps needed many descriptions, but now with three words you already have an idea of the image". "I have taken advantage of the fact that we are visual generations. I think that each scene is a story for me. I could make an Instagram post for each scene," reveals Gatnau, declaring herself a millennial writer.
When asked if she considers herself one of the new voices in Catalan literature, the author of Canviar de pell still does not dare to say so. "I think I need to write," she merely admits. However, she concludes that she likes "new young, female voices to enter the Catalan literary scene and to be read". Perhaps to attribute this label to her, we will have to wait for her second novel, on which she is already working and which, like her first, will once again be full of female characters.
