Rosa Regàs

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Rosa Regàs (2014).

Rosa Regàs i Pagés (* 1933 in Barcelona ) is a Catalan writer who writes in Spanish .

Rosa Regàs worked as both editor and translator for the United Nations. She also founded the publishing house La Gaya Ciencia and the magazines Arquitectura Vis and Cuadernos de la Gaya Ciencia . She has published various novels, short stories, reports, articles and travel books, with some of her works receiving awards.

On May 14, 2004, Regàs was appointed director of the Spanish National Library. On August 27, 2007 she announced her resignation as director of the Spanish National Library and justified this with the loss of confidence in the Spanish Minister of Culture César Antonio Molina .

biography

Political background

The “losers” of the civil war , who fought on the side of the republic, left the country ruled by Franco, with the Regàs family among them. She fled to neighboring France. There Rosa Regàs attended a school shaped by the naturalistic worldview. When the civil war ended, however, the family returned to Spain. From then on, Rosa attended a monastery. There she began reading Spanish authors as well as Russian and French classics of the 19th century.

Study time

After graduating from high school, she married and raised her first two sons; she studied at the University of Barcelona and successfully graduated in philosophy. During her studies, she met Spanish poets such as José Agustín Goytisolo, Jaime Gil de Biedma, and Gabriel Ferraté. She acquired her literary skills at the publishing house Seix Barral from Carlos Barral, where she worked from 1964 to 1970. In the meantime, she raised three other sons.

Own publishing house (1970–1983)

In 1970 Rosa Regàs left Seix Barral and founded her own publishing house: La Gaya Ciencia . She chooses the name based on Nietzsche and in memory of her time studying philosophy. In the following years she published relatively unknown authors, including Juan Benet, Álvaro Pombo, María Zambrano, Manuel Vázquez Montalbán, Javier Marías, as well as poetry and a range of literature for children. She also directed two magazines: Cuadernos de la Gaya Ciencia and Arquitectura Vis .

In 1983 she decided to sell her publishing house in order to work as a translator and temporary editor in various cities around the world (Geneva, New York, Washington, Nairobi and Paris) for United Nations organizations at the end of the same year.

Beginning of writing and public relations

In 1991 her first novel, Memoria de Almator , was published, which tells of the struggle of the agricultural industry. A woman who is constantly protected by her male caregivers commits suicide.

On her fiftieth birthday, she was awarded the Premio Nadal for the novel Azul . In the following time Regàs published articles in El País and various travel magazines. Her weekly column in El Correo de Bilbao has also been published in the Grupo's magazines . In 1994 Rosa Regàs became director of the Ateneo de la casa de América in Madrid.

At the beginning of 2003 she traveled to Central America with Pedro Molina Temboury. A book about the experiences of her travels was published within a very short time.

Over the years Regàs toured North and South America, Africa from east to west, many countries in Europe including the North Pole and a large part of Asia. In addition to Ginebra , she wrote Viaje a la luz del Cham , which reports on the experiences of her stay (April, May and June 1993) in Syria.

The next novel was Luna Lunera , the story of four children of a Republican man and grandsons of Frankists in post-war Spain. For this book, Regàs received the Premio Ciutat de Barcelona in 1999 . Further books such as Canciones de amor y de batalla y Otras canciones and Desde el mar appeared. In 2001 she won the Premio Planeta with the novel La Canción de Dorotea .

On March 14, 2004, Rosa Regàs was appointed director of the National Library.

The author

The idea for the novel Luna Lunera came up very early, but it took more than half a century before Rosa Regàs actually became a writer. She recognized her weakness for books and magazines in the convent school, where the first attempts at writing began. After school, she enrolled in philosophy, and through contact with Spanish poets such as José Agustín Goytisolo and Gabriel Ferrater, she gained her first concrete access to international poetry. At the age of about 22, Rosa Regàs tried her hand at a novella. The failure made her not write for many years. In 1970, out of ideological conviction, she founded her own publishing house, which she named La Gaya Ciencia ('The Happy Science') in honor of the forgotten studies of Friedrich Nietzsche's philosophy, against the power-economic grievances of the then predominant publishing industry . She devoted herself to the publication of mostly little-known authors such as Juan Benet or María Zambrano as well as a collection for children (Moby Dick). At almost 50 years of age, the urge for her own publication in Rosa Regàs was so great that she sold her publisher. At the request of a publisher, she did not begin her writing career until 1987 with a book about Geneva, where she lived at the time.

Rosa Regàs on the role of the writer

Rosa Regàs did not become a writer until she was over 50, but she has a strong attitude towards this profession. She said the following about the task of the writer: A writer is always on the lookout for an undiscovered paradise that is deep within him. He should bring back forgotten feelings, wishes, and desires and make them accessible to people in his own way. The readers then transform this completely independently created world of autonomies and personalities into their own novel. Complacency. By founding her own publishing house, publishing unknown authors and opening up access to literature for children, Rosa Regàs took on responsibility for literature as a cultural asset.

Published works

  1. Novels
    1. Memoria de Almator , 1991
    2. Azul , 1994
    3. Luna Lunera , 1999
    4. La canción de Dorotea , 2001
    5. Diario de una abuela de verano , 2004
  2. Travel books
    1. Ginebra , 1998
    2. Viaje a la luz del Cham , 1995
    3. España: una nueva mirada , 1997
    4. La cuina de l'ampurdanet , 1985
  3. Short stories / narratives
    1. Pobre corazón , 1996
    2. Un alto en el camino . In: Relatos para un fin de milenio , 1998
    3. A la sombra de los cipreses . In: Cuentos solidarios , 1999
    4. Los funerales de la esperanza . In: Mujeres al alba , 1999
    5. La hija del penal . In: Orosia , 2002
    6. Lo que esconde la guerra . In: La paz y la palabra , 2003
    7. Hi havia una vegada , 2001 (Cuentos populares de Cataluña)
    8. Per un món millor , 2002
    9. El valor de la protesta. The compromiso con la vida , 2004
  4. items
    1. Canciones de amor y de batalla , 1995
    2. Una revolución personal , 1997
    3. Juan Benet . In: Retratos literarios , 1997
    4. Desde el mar , 1997
    5. Más canciones , 1998
    6. La creación, la fantasía y la vida , 1998
    7. Sangre de mi sangre: la aventura de los hijos , 1999

Awards

1994: El Premio Nadal (Spain) for their Azul plant . The Premio Nadal is the oldest and one of the most prestigious literary prizes in Spain, which has been awarded by the Destino publishing house in Barcelona since 1944 for unpublished manuscripts for novels (18,000 euros). It is awarded on January 6th to important figures in Spanish literature of the twentieth century.

2000: Premio Ciudad de Barcelona for the Luna Lunera plant .

2001: Premio Planeta for the book La canción de Dorotea . The Premio Planeta is a literature prize that has been awarded by the Planeta publishing house since 1952. The prize is endowed with 3,000,000 euros.

2005: Rosa Regàs and Pedro Molina Temboury won the 8th Premio Grandes Viajeros. This prize was awarded by the Ediciones B e Iberia for the work entitled Volcanos dormidos . In addition, the price is associated with 30,000 euros and a trip around the world or several flights worth 12,000.

literature

  • Mechthild Albert: On the meaning of the female memory in the current Spanish novel. In: Hispanorama. Journal of the German Association of Spanish Teachers (DSV). No. 104, pp. 16-20.
  • Hans-Jörg Neuschäfer (Ed.): Spanish literary history. 2nd Edition. Metzler, Stuttgart 2001, ISBN 3-476-01857-1 .

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Regàs, Rosa
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Regàs i Pagés, Rosa (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Spanish writer
DATE OF BIRTH 1933
PLACE OF BIRTH Barcelona