A few days before the celebration of the Immaculate Conception, the Pure, a few weeks before Christmas, or last Monday and because yes, Ignasi Moreta presents at Espai Abacus You will not take the name of God in vain (Fragmenta), the second of the series that the publisher dedicates to the ten commandments. The public occupies all the available seats. Listening intently, I distinguish Lídia Pujol, Carles Duarte, Carles Torner and Joan Carles Mèlich. We are surrounded by books, but also by toys, and because of those things about adapting to the space, some of the books are scenographically arranged on shelves that couldn't say it any more clearly: "You learn to live by playing!". What is reading and conversation but playing?
Professor Francesco Ardolino assures that as a child, when he went to catechesis, he understood that this commandment was very simple to fulfill, because it was about not denying. But, alas, it turns out that he lived in "the Roman outskirts, like the Bronx, and there everyone apostatized, including the priests!". Ardolino, a "radical agnostic", assures that he does not want to reduce the book to a slogan, and quotes Dante to talk about the various interpretations of a psalm, after all, the use of language - which is also the subject of oración –, and assures that it is a very well written book that asks more questions than it does not find answers. The nun Teresa Forcades, as a good theologian, makes a dissertation that at times seems for experts, with a certain terminological density. "A nice review of the book", he says. For her, "trying to explain God is trying to explain myself", that is to say, also asking questions, because "what would humanity be without questions that have no answers?". Moreta explains that, although the book was written in a few months, it also includes "almost thirty years of readings and reflections on religion". He assumes that you don't need to be a theologian to write about religion, but "sometimes it seems that anything goes, and it's not that either". Boldly, he defends that the second commandment is "a charge in depth against the dangers of religion from the very heart of religion", because it is often religious classes that, in his opinion, use God interestedly. He even reflects on a spirituality and a religion without God.
While the conversation ends, I run so as not to make it to the Masses said at the Publishing Night that the Editors' Guild of Catalonia has convened at the Teatre Goya, with such exhaustive representation of the sector that we dare not go into detail. Just one scene, already on the street: while a group of editors decide where to go to fill their stomachs, a boy approaches, between nervous and euphoric, asking that if someone has tobacco, buy them a cigarette, and of course, there there are those who give directly, and he who is not saying that it is necessary to celebrate everything, "that today is the best day of my life". We think he's exaggerating, or joking, but then he explains that he's been in prison for eight years, "for trafficking," and he's just out on parole, and he shows us the monitoring bracelet on his ankle, and we all understand, but no , this is not only the reason for the joy, but he is going to see his son, the thing he is most excited about. Let's look at the positive side of life, yes, we don't need Monty Python to remind us every day.
It goes without saying that one of the pleasures of life is sex, first-class literary material, but often it doesn't have the desired effect, with scenes that are more disturbing than anything else. Carlota Rubio has excited the people of La Finestres to celebrate an evening that rewards the worst sexual scenes in the most recent Catalan narrative. "The worst sex of the year" is an idea inspired by the Bad Sex Awards awarded annually by the magazine The Literary Review, and given the good reception, Marina Espasa talks about "the first gala of this contest", it is in say, that from the start there should be at least a second one. We'll get there. The bookstore is full of a hundred young people who have come to play and vote, and also to listen to how Pol Mallafré and Oye Sherman read the selected fragments. Yes, the two readers are humorists, because it's not about making a treatise, no. Playing you learn to live!
Fifteen texts have been selected from the latest books by Pere Antoni Pons (Contra el món), Marc Vintró (A wild urge to cry), Gemma Ruiz Palà (Our mothers), Andrea Genovart (Consum preferent), Carlota Gurt (Biography of fire), Raül Garrigasait (Prophecy), Júlia Bacardit (A sentimental diary), Borja Bagunyà (A dark house and a scourge), Irene Solà (I gave you eyes and you looked into the darkness), Albert Sánchez Piñol (Prayer to Prosérpina ), Eva Baltasar (Triptych), Emma Zafón (Married and silent), Xavier Bosch (March 32) and Sílvia Soler (Estimada Gris). Special mention must go to Laura Calçada, who not only dared to be there, but also chose and read a scene from her Fucking New York herself.
Once the fragments have been read and laughed at, while the ballots are being counted, a long scene is read, out of competition, from Urbàs and Org: The Blood of the Gods (Edicions Secc), a delirious - in a good way, clear – proposed by David Gómez Simó.
The verdict is in: "Adam rides me to the rhythm of Shakespearean iambic pentameter or whatever Richard II's lines are made of," says part of the winning excerpt. It is by Marc Vintró, but it is clear, as Rubio has said, that "the quality of the scene is not proportional to that of the book".
There are also some editors: Rosa Rey and Irene Pujadas, from Angle, and Marina Llompart, from L'Altra, and Laia Regincós, who in Ela Geminada has released an erotic collection, Idil·lis, because "from sex you can talk about many things".
