Dark Vales (Paperback)

Raimon Casellas

ISBN 10: 1909232610 / ISBN 13: 9781909232617

Published by Dedalus Ltd, Cambs, 2014

About this Item

Paperback. The first English translation of a classic of fin de siecle Catalan literature. It is based on the conflict between the Individual and Society, Good and Evil, Life and Death, the Spirit and the Flesh. The protagonist, Father Latzer, a priest banished for doctrinal heresy to an isolated, backward mountain parish, struggles to achieve personal redemption by bringing salvation to his primitive, taciturn, rural flock. Their mute atavism is disturbed only by the local whore, Footloose, embodying all the forces against which the priest's reforming mission is directed, and ambiguity surrounds the denouement of that conflict. The action is set in a recognisable time and a landscape which, through the power of Casellas's language, is endowed with a complex poetic charge and is as compelling today as when it was first written. AUTHOR: Raimon Casellas i Dou (b. Barcelona 1855) died, almost certainly by suicide, in 1910. The motives for his premature death can be read between the lines of his 1901 novel Dark Vales (Els sots ferestecs). He published two collections of short stories (Les multituds: 1906; Llibre d'histories: 1909). Casellas was an art historian, critic and a leading figure in Catalan Modernisme, which aspired to set Catalan culture on the same cosmopolitan footing as the advanced national cultures of contemporary Europe. Translator Alan Yates' first English translation of 'Dark Vales' allows English readers to appreciate the work of one of the most important Catalan authors of his period. Shipping may be from multiple locations in the US or from the UK, depending on stock availability.

Seller Inventory # 9781909232617

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Dark Vales (Paperback)
• Publisher: Dedalus Ltd, Cambs
• Publication Date: 2014
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1909232610
• ISBN 13: 9781909232617
• Binding: Paperback
• Condition: new

About this title

Synopsis

The protagonist, Father Llatzer, a priest banished for doctrinal heresy to an isolated, backward mountain parish, struggles to achieve personal redemption by bringing salvation to his primitive, taciturn, rural flock. Their mute atavism is disturbed only by the local whore, Footloose, embodying all the forces against which the priest's reforming mission is directed. Ambiguity surrounds the denouement of that conflict.

Dark Vales is as as compelling today as when it was first written.

About the Authors

Raimon Casellas i Dou (b. Barcelona 1855) died, almost certainly by suicide, in 1910. The motives for his premature death can be read between the lines of his 1901 novel Dark Vales (Els sots ferestecs). He published two collections of short stories (Les multituds: 1906; Llibre d'hista²ries: 1909). Casellas was an art historian, critic and a leading figure in Catalan Modernisme, which aspired to set Catalan culture on the same cosmopolitan footing as the advanced national cultures of contemporary Europe.

Alan Yates, born in Northampton in 1944, is Emeritus Professor of Catalan at Sheffield University where he worked for 30 years, after graduation (1966) and then a Ph.D. (1971) from Cambridge. His teaching and research straddled the fields of the language and the modern literature of the Catalan-speaking lands. He has published several books and numerous articles in these fields, now keeping a foot in both by devoting himself to literary translation. The rest of his time is devoted to mountaineering and nostalgic fell-running.

Eva Bosch is a Catalan painter, writer and video maker. She writes on prehistoric art, and has lectured on Picasso and Miro at the National Gallery, Tate Modern and the Instituto Cervantes. Born in Barcelona, she grew up in Montmany-Figuero, the village where Dark Vales takes place. In 1973, she fled the upheavals of Franco's regime to settle in the UK. She now lives and works in London with regular sojourns in her atelier in her home village, combining her studio work with lecturing in the History of Art. www.evabosch.co.uk