A Barcelonesa

In "A Barcelonesa" death triggers the narrative. A remarkable building, which connects the Lugo mountains with Havana, the Navy and the city of A Coruña, spans three generations as a witness to its ups and downs and defines the living space of grandparents, parents and children. In this very personal novel, Xabier Paz reconstructs, with his usual stylistic vocation, the almost one hundred years of tension between family life and the social events that make up the particular biographies and wishes of the characters: Cuban emigration, triumphant return, war, economic ruin and the struggle for survival stand as a metaphor for the country. Memory will compose this narration in two voices in an attempt to complete the mere individual vision. The two narrators with the same score interpret very different cadences. The contrast between the sensual and distant vision with the most intimate and identitarian allows the contrasting contemplation of a common past. The family building, one hundred years old, appears as the seat of domestic and social memory, a place to claim the absent.