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.

Translated by: Douglas Suttle