On the occasion of Kosmopolis 2021, the Libraries of Barcelona consortium has organised a conversation between two authors of different but complementary standpoints on reading. This event will be moderated by Angelina Cabré, director of the Sant Gervasi-Joan Maragall Library, where Sebastià Portell and Joaquín Rodríguez with speak about their most recent books.
Les nenes que llegien al lavabo (The Girls Who Read in the Toilet – Ara llibres, 2021), by Sebastià Portell, a work between essay and musings, is a cry for freedom in reading. It is a journey through his own memory and also through community life in which he speaks of pleasure and obligation, of dissidents and canons. La furia de la lectura. Por qué seguir leyendo en el siglo XXI (The Fury of Reading: Why Keep Reading in the Twenty-First Century – Tusquets, 2021), by Joaquín Rodríguez, is a reflection on the sense of reading, an analysis of the power of the printed word, an exercise in seeking arguments to call for reading as a founding element of humanism, wisdom, and freedom.
Since 27 April and with the aim of encouraging the participation of professionals from the Catalan public libraries in the Kosmopolis conversation, the two authors have been leading a virtual readers’ club on Tellfy in which they discuss their works. In this project, participants converse with the writers by means of a chat and videoconference.
