Pau Riba

An artist in the broadest sense of the word, a champion of counterculture over his long career, he has just published Història de l’univers.

A versatile artist best known for his music, Pau Riba is also an accomplished poet. His extensive and diverse work, which includes more than a dozen books of poetry, essays and fiction has made him one of the great names in the world of Catalan counterculture. In 1967 he co-founded Grup de Folk, a collective that set out to reinvent Catalan popular music of the time. A year later he published his first book, Cançons i poemes (Les hores extres), with a prologue by Raimon, which highlighted its vibrant, clear and transgressive writing. In the early 1970s he published what is considered the greatest work of his discography: Dioptria I and II, best album of the 20th century according to Enderrock magazine. In 1997, the publishing house Proa released the compilation Lletrarada, a tribute to his long career as a lyricist. In 2019, 50 years after his first great musical success, he set off on the Dioptria 50 commemorative tour, accompanied by the band De Mortimers. Two years later he published the poetic prose work Història de l’univers (Males Herbes, 2021), in which he offers an overview of the theories of how the cosmos was formed, ending with the evolution of life on the planet and the technological future of cyborgs. Throughout his prolific career he has also been a collaborator with cultural magazines such as the Sunday supplements of El Periódico and La Vanguardia and has participated as an actor in various plays and films.

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