Carlos Barral i Agesta (1928–1989) was a Spanish

poet A poet is a person who studies and creates poetry. Poets may describe themselves as such or be described as such by others. A poet may simply be the creator ( thinker, songwriter, writer, or author) who creates (composes) poems (oral or writte ...

, considered (along with

Jaime Gil de Biedma Jaime Gil de Biedma y Alba (13 November 1929 – 8 January 1990) was a Spanish post-Civil War poet. He was born in Nava de la Asunción on 13 November 1929. He stopped writing poetry some ten years before his death. He insisted that the charac ...

) to be one of the greatest poets of the so-called generation of the 1950s. He helped to establish the Formentor Group and their literary awards the

Prix Formentor The Prix Formentor (also known as Premio Formentor de las Letras, Formentor Literature Prize and The Formentor Prize) is an international literary award given between 1961 and 1967, and, after a long break, from 2011. In the 1960s, the Formentor Gr ...

and the Prix International. He was also a member of the

European Parliament The European Parliament (EP) is one of the legislative bodies of the European Union and one of its seven institutions. Together with the Council of the European Union (known as the Council and informally as the Council of Ministers), it adopts ...

and an important publisher.

Biography

Carlos Barral was born in Barcelona,

Spain , image_flag = Bandera de España.svg , image_coat = Escudo de España (mazonado).svg , national_motto = ''Plus ultra'' (Latin)(English: "Further Beyond") , national_anthem = (English: "Royal March") , i ...

. In 1957, he joined Víctor Seix in the management of the publishing house Seix Barral, which had been founded by his parents in 1911, and which became the most prestigious publishing house in the 1960s and thereafter. Looking for a way to further open up Spanish literature Markets, Barral organised, through the Seix Barral, a series of annual meetings of publishers, novelists and critics. These 'Coloquio Internacional de Novela' ('International Colloquium of the Novel') were held in

Formentor Cap de Formentor () is the northernmost point of Majorca, on the Formentor peninsula. Location Cap de Formentor is located on the northernmost point of the Balearic Island Majorca in Spain. Its highest point, ''Fumart'', is 384m above sea lev ...

Majorca Mallorca, or Majorca, is the largest island in the Balearic Islands, which are part of Spain and located in the Mediterranean. The capital of the island, Palma, is also the capital of the autonomous community of the Balearic Islands. The Ba ...

, Spain between 1959 and 1962, paid for by international publishers. As a compromise between literary and commercial goals, two prizes were devised: the Prix International and the

, to be initiated in 1961. Prize winners included

Borges Jorge Francisco Isidoro Luis Borges Acevedo (; ; 24 August 1899 – 14 June 1986) was an Argentine short-story writer, essayist, poet and translator, as well as a key figure in Spanish-language and international literature. His best-known b ...

, Beckett and Bellow."The boom in Barcelona: literary modernism in Spanish and Spanish-American fiction (1950-1974)" by Mayder Dravasa
in Volume 130 of ''Currents in comparative Romance languages and literatures'', p73. Publisher: Peter Lang, 2005 , Barral also participated in the launching and management of the publishing house Barral Editores in 1970. Barral was a senator in the

Socialists' Party of Catalonia The Socialists' Party of Catalonia ( ca, Partit dels Socialistes de Catalunya, PSC–PSOE official acronym) is a social-democratic political party in Catalonia, Spain, resulting from the merger of three parties: the Socialist Party of Cataloni ...

Spanish Socialist Workers' Party The Spanish Socialist Workers' Party ( es, Partido Socialista Obrero Español ; PSOE ) is a Social democracy, social-democraticThe PSOE is described as a social-democratic party by numerous sources: * * * * List of political parties in Spai ...

for

Tarragona Tarragona (, ; Phoenician: ''Tarqon''; la, Tarraco) is a port city located in northeast Spain on the Costa Daurada by the Mediterranean Sea. Founded before the fifth century BC, it is the capital of the Province of Tarragona, and part of Tarr ...

in 1982 and afterwards its European Parliament representative. He is best known for his two poetry books, ''Metropolitano, 19 historias de mi guerra civil'' ("Metropolitan, 19 Stories of My Civil War") and'' Lecciones de cosas'' ("Lessons of Things"), but his three volumes of

memoir A memoir (; , ) is any nonfiction narrative writing based in the author's personal memories. The assertions made in the work are thus understood to be factual. While memoir has historically been defined as a subcategory of biography or autobio ...

s are also held in high esteem.

Works

*''Metropolitano'' (1957) *''Diecinueve figuras de mi historia civil'' (1961) *''Usuras'' (1965) *''Figuración y fuga'' (1966) *''Informe personal sobre el alba'' (1970) *''Usuras y figuraciones'' (1973) *''Años de penitencia'' (1975) *''Los años sin excusa'' (1978) *''Catalunya des del mar'' (1982) *''Catalunya a vol d'ocell'' (1985) *''Lecciones de cosas: Veinte poemas para el nieto Malcolm'' (1986) *''Cuando las horas veloces'' (1988) *''Antología poética'' (1989) *''Los diarios'' (1993, published posthumously)

External links

Poems from Carlos Barral

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Barral, Carlos 1928 births 1989 deaths Politicians from Barcelona Poets from Catalonia Socialists' Party of Catalonia politicians Socialists' Party of Catalonia MEPs MEPs for Spain 1987–1989 20th-century Spanish poets