Barcelona. The presentation of the book “Barcelona Desnuda” by Amaranta Sbardella, with the author and with the participation of Joan Abelló, will be held on September7th at the Italian Institute of Culture of Barcelona. In modern-day Barcelona, a young librarian intern locked himself in his shabby apartment, in the multi-ethnic Raval district to catalog books on contemporary Catalan and Castilian literature on behalf of the Central Library. Suddenly the index cards of some of the major works on Barcelona, which he had been working on for days, disappear. The characters in the works that he is cataloging can’t stand to be imprisoned in their aseptic and reductive cards, so they decided to take possession of them and go out into the street to finally free themselves, and regain possession of “their” Barcelona. 10 stories featuring the characters of books by famous Catalan and Spanish authors: Petra Delicado, Clara Barcelò, and Pepe Carvalho wandering around the city showing us a very different Barcelona from the stereotypical image that the tourist itineraries give us. The book is not just a guide, but a mosaic of styles and narrative: each story is written with the style of the original work to which it belongs and each chapter is introduced by a prologue in the style of Don Quixote. (9Colonne)
