fum d'estampa press gb (60 results)

Paperback. Condition: New. A mysterious traveller arrives in Turin for an atypical congress that disturbs the peace of the city while awakening a host of demons. From this enigmatic, hypnotic premise emerges a journey into light and darkness, desire and secrecy. An exquisite odyssey of characters and memorable scenes. Mixing legend, reality and religion, Josep M. Argemí has created a world of demons, exorcisms and another world existing parallel to our own. And he does this in a lyrical style that keeps the reader guessing until the very end.

Paperback. Condition: New. Written in nine chapters separated into three blocks, Narcís Oller's The Madness is one of the first literary pieces of work to aim to truly analyze the social and genetic causes and results of mental illness. Told through the eyes of an anonymous "narrator" character, The Madness tells the story of a young revolutionary called Daniel Serrallonga and his gradual deterioration into madness and delusion. Set against the backdrop of the political crisis that ripped Spain apart in the mid to late 19th century and laid the foundations of the Spanish Civil War, The Madness is a fascinating study of mental health within both rural and urban Catalan society.As relevant and entertaining now as it was when it was first published, this lively translation brings this fantastic piece of literature to new, modern audiences while drawing parallels with some of the 19th century's greatest English language writers such as Charles Dickens and Thomas Hardy.

Paperback. Condition: New. LONDON. In Wilder Winds, Bel Olid presents a stunning collection of short stories that draw on notions of individual freedom, abuses of power, ingrained social violence, life on the outskirts of society, and inevitable differences. Alongside these are small acts of kindness capable of changing the world and making it a better place. Like flowers stubbornly growing and blooming in the cracks of a pavement, Olid's work seeks out beauty without renouncing truth, and never avoids conflict or intimacy. Wilder Winds creates scenes and fragile, yet hardy characters that will stay with the reader for years to come.

Paperback. Condition: New. A blank voice in the middle of the night tells Michaël Ferrier of the deaths of his friend François and his daughter Bahia. In the following devastation, speech resumes and memories return: how two young loners meet and connect, their years of study, their passion for cinema and radio. Memories unfold and gradually come together in a chronicle of friendship and a memorial to a lost friend.François, Portrait of an Absent Friend is both an elegy to a friend and a wonderfully delicate, poetic look at friendship in general. Ferrier tells us how friendships are formed, how they are lost, how they are maintained, and what happens when they are taken from us. From Paris to Japan, Ferrier transports us to the writer's time and the place as we feel the pain, the bitterness, and the longing left by François' death.

Paperback. Condition: New. In the eight stories presented in The Song of Youth, Montserrat Roig (Barcelona, 1946-1991) employs languageas a weapon against political and social "dismemory", enabling the stories of those silenced by the brutal Francoregime to come to the fore. Feminist, critical but always lyrical, Roig's writing gives shape and meaning to thehuman experience.

Paperback. Condition: New. Pulling no punches in its 150 pages, Pharmakon is the story of an explosion, of the moment depression blew up the life the author thought she knew and settled in her body. But Pharmakon isn't a sad book; it is testimony, written with humour and intimacy by one of Spain's most singular voices, one that deftly combines wit, eccentricity, and warmth. Far from shrinking from taboos, Sánchez grabs hold of her depression and dredges it for the whys and hows, excavating her memory, behaviour, and craters of the mind: here there is infancy and the family home, youth at school in Mallorca and in the fields of Castile; psychiatrists who save and pills that bring her back to life; there are dreams, nightmares, and desires. And books, lots of books-some that serve to escape and others to understand what was happening in her head-because for Sánchez, literature is comfort, quest, and salvation. Pharmakon is an insight, from one of Spain's most singular voices, into the experience of depression and recovery.

Paperback. Condition: New. Set on the island of Anjouan, Comoros, Deranged As I Am follows the story of a humble docker. With his ramshackle cart and patched-up clothes, he spends his days trying to find enough work to feed himself. This whirlwind of a novel takes place over just a few days, yet Zamir's poetic and energetic prose transports us to the docks, its noises, colours, and smells, and the dynamism of his language along with his powerful mix of genres, and the cleverness of his verbal invention perfectly serve this tragicomedy that makes us feel both joy and pity. Yet this lively and often darkly humorous prose does not draw away from the more serious themes of class, poverty, and exploitation that Zamir explores. A rich and significant text that questions literature and language itself, Deranged As I Am confirms the very original place Zamir occupies in French literature.

Paperback. Condition: New. How does one experience things from the viewpoint of the other sex? It is this question that has led to Vildot's creation of Ruth, the genre-defining story of a sex change told by the protagonist through a series of letters to an anonymous friend. Far from the condemnatory gaze or noise of those who understand life as nothing but outward appearances, Ruth demonstrates the sentimental and intellectual intimacy of a man transitioning into a woman, and describes a profund, touching process in which frustrations, ideas of liberty and changes of identity are interwoven.Without descending into easy morbosity or exhibitions of sensationalist tendencies, Ruth represents Guillem Viladot's indignation at both masculine and feminine sensibilities, while championing diversity of thought, love, liberty, and, most importantly, desire.

Paperback. Condition: New. LONDON. The pinnacle of Fuster's essay writing, Final Judgements is a book of aphorisms that, used to teach moral and/or philosophical truths, reveal things that are relevant to the universal human experience. As Adam Gopnick of The New Yorker puts it, "the aphorism is, in its algebraic abbreviation, a micro-model of empirical inquiry." And Fuster uses the aphoristic tradition, less to establish truths than to undermine them, to question the conceits contained in the established truism. Despite the seriousness of its subject matter, however, this book is laugh-out-loud funny, Fuster's wit revealing that the best aphorisms are based in stripping language of its artifice and revealing its contradictions, and the cumulative effect is a quintessentially Mediterranean kind of playfulness.

Paperback. Condition: New. LONDON. When Anaïs learns of the imminent expropriation of the small family vineyard due to the upcoming construction of an estate, she demands that her father refuse out of dignity. From here, a solitary struggle begins, obsessive and irrational in the eyes of both relatives and neighbours alike, but which Anaïs seems ready to take all the way. Written in sweeping, elegant prose, Maica Rafecas brings us the beauty of the vineyard and the terrible human cost that modern-day capitalism makes us pay. September and the Night is at once an elegy to the land and its people, and a warning against those who might to use it for purely financial gains. This book acts as a rebellion, a reminder of the important things in life, and a call to arms, all within a beautifully written, almost fable-like novel.

Paperback. Condition: New. The Intimate Resistance is a keen, deeply beautiful reflection on the human condition. The author explains howwe ourselves can warm, protect and guide those around us. "The intimate resistance is the name for an experience belonging to a state of proximity; a state cannot be visited in one day, but rather habitually. Today, to remain in this state is by no means simple. Proximity cannot be measured in metres or centimetres. Its opposite is not distance, but rather the ubiquitous monotony of a world dominated by technology. What is clear is that day to day and home life are essential ways of experiencing proximity.".

Paperback. Condition: New. Award-winning poet, translator, and academic, Jaume Subirana is one of Catalonia's most treasured poets, winning some of its most prestigious prizes for his poetry and essays. In an eloquent translation from accomplished poet and translator Christopher Whyte, The Silent Letter showcases Subirana's sharp observations, delicate eye for detail, stunningly beautiful images, and poignant suspension of the moment.

Paperback. Condition: New. LONDON. Wild Horses is a brutally powerful, unflinching account of the heroin epidemic that swept across Catalonia in the 1980s. The novel, told from a variety of points of view, tells the story of a group of friends as they buy, sell, and consume heroin and other drugs in their home town. Wild Horses is a kaleidoscope of voices, stories, song lyrics and heartbreakingly all-too-real characters. It is a true classic of modern story-telling that is both shocking and captivating at the same time.

Paperback. Condition: New. LONDON. This collection features one hundred poems selected by award-winning poet Jordi Larios. Keenly aware that we measure the world through words, he also knows that words become worn with use, and that poetry recalibrates their instrumentation, injecting them with fresh focus for graphing elusive terrains of inner and outer experience, prodding us to encounter and engage the world in a way that sustains and renews the self. Each Larios poem is a magnet, impacting us with the infixed force that its reading unleashes, subtle yet powerful in its imagery. A seagull, unfazed by the 'crisis of the sunset,' declares life on a greying backdrop ('Rough Weather'), and desolate landscapes can set the scene for unexpected solace ('Cold,' 'Historical Present'): pulling sunken memories to the surface and bringing poetic imagery into alignment with points of inwardness in search of outward counterparts. Along with the subtle power of imagery, Larios blends into his poems an uncanny marshalling of words, reassigning them to posts of optimal meaning and musicality. Technique underlies the poems, but the resulting art is greater than the sum of words, lifting language above 'the clattering of / too many words,' which, bereft of poetry, only render us alone ('Man Alone').

Paperback. Condition: New. LONDON. Empordan Scafarlata is a mirage of memories written with intelligence, irony, courage and tenderness; linking tradition, modernity, resentment and nostalgia for a mythical country and for that part of the river in which: 'he will never swim again.' In a mixture of prose and poetry, Adrià Pujol brings us snippets of Empordà, a region of northern Catalonia wedged between the mountains and the sea, and invites us onto its sweaty, well-trodden, exalted paths. All this he does it by avoiding conventions, clichés and with the sincerity of someone who writes about a world he loves and which for that very reason he does not simplify, rather elaborating it with powerful, eclectic prose, showcasing the writing that has pushed Adrià Pujol to the very forefront of great Catalan writing.

Paperback. Condition: New. London Under Snow is delicate, compact, mature and profound collection of short stories about winter by Jordi Llavina. Six fragments of different lives in six different moment. In this beautifully written collection, the characters come face to face with their different lives and pasts, all of which are full of ghosts and memories. Sensibility courses through each story, all of them written with a meticulous eye to detail and a careful lyricism that pays tribute to the human condition and the society that we have created.Bringing winter and Christmas celebrations in a variety of places and cultures to life in a selection of beautifully written short stories, Llavina mixes personal experiences with fictional characters to blur the lines between fiction and reality.'Llavina exhibits his great ability to successfully penetrate our psyches.'Lluís Muntada, El País'Presided over by tenderness and truth, Jordi Llavina's stories are beautiful, cathartic masterpieces.'Anna M. Gil, La Vanguàrdia'The narrative fabric of these stories is the voice - sensitive, powerful, complicated and dedicated - that Llavina creates for each of us. Almost personal, he whispers gently in our ears.'Ramon Pla i Arxé, La Vanguàrdia.

Paperback. Condition: New. Griselda is the mother of three children, two boys and one girl. On a winter day in the mid-1980s, while exiled in France, she drowned her two sons in the bathtub. After a lapse of more than thirty years, the narrator tracks down the survivors of this family tragedy. She delves into their story in an attempt to approach these barely credible events, and ends up - in the depths of darkness - getting a glimpse of love and life. Laura Alcoba's subtle, gentle writing accurately captures her characters' humanity, without any overwrought sentiment, nor emphasis, in spite of the horrific facts. We feel the presence of beings resonating without, however, anyone ever being able to unlock the mystery of Griselda's act - even Griselda herself.

Paperback. Condition: New. A plague of Asian wasps endangers the production of honey in a neighbourhood in the middle of the Dordogne. On a sweltering summer day, someone arrives to make an environmental report and finds a fragile microclimate on the verge of collapse. An elderly couple, Emma and Olivier, welcome some young citizens whom no one knows into their home and who, according to the village bar, are desperate. As witness, the villagers have an ancient mirror, a chrysalis clinging to a hinge and the old translator who, losing his memory and faculties, observes them all from the library. A halo of tragedy hovers over the district: the visit of a foreign woman, the intrigues of her son to build a housing estate there, the disappearance of a dog, the life calendar of the florist, guided by the garrison of bouquets and the first wreath. Susanna Rafart unfolds a fable with a ternary rhythm of unusual beauty. A gem in which readers catch glimpses of everything that is hinted at and are moved by what is kept silent.

Paperback. Condition: New. In 1837, at the height of the Carlist Wars and a time of conflict between the past and future, a young Prussianman crosses the Pyrenees to fight for the 'Order'. Finding himself trapped in the ruins of an abandoned city,his bewilderment at the war and what it means increases. Friendship, family, religion and politics: everythingis distorted, transformed or destroyed. The Others oscillates masterfully between humour and tragedy and is anovel full of music, eccentric characters and extraordinary scenes.

Paperback. Condition: New. Andrea Víctrix presents a dystopian vision of Palma, Mallorca, now named 'Turclub', in the year 2050. Theunnamed narrator, who bears a certain resemblance to the author, had placed himself in voluntary cryo-stasisin 1965, fatigued by modern 'civilization' and morality, only to reawaken 85 years later with the physique of a30-year old. Villalonga sets up an intriguing interplay between the narrator and the eponymous, androgynousAndrea Víctrix, so-called Director of Pleasure, in a satirical, sometimes self-ironizing exploration of contemporaryissues such as gender and sexuality, consumerism, environmental disaster and the politics of big business.Both of its time and startlingly prescient, Andrea Víctrix merits a place amongst the greats of Europeandystopian fiction.

Paperback. Condition: New. Atlantis is a majestic, epic poem and a lasting jewel of Catalan literary tradition. With a colossal architecture and a descriptive power that creates memorable passages of prodigious beauty - the vision of the garden of the Hesperides and the dream of Queen Isabel are just some examples - this poem was the winner of the Jocs Florals in 1877, the forging work of the modern Catalan literary language, and earned Verdaguer literary recognition in and outside of Catalonia.

Paperback. Condition: New. This bilingual collection of both Maragall's poetry and prose has been edited and translated by Ronald Puppo, a research fellow and translator at the University of Vic. His keen eye and expertise on Maragall comes across in droves as he takes what are arguably Catalan literatures finest moments and turns them into eminently readable and enjoyable English language poems. Also included in this collection are some of Maragall's pieces of prose work and personal letters that shed light onto the man himself. Accompanying all this are Puppo's own indepth comments and insights.