Berta Jardí Soler (Barcelona, 11 September 1956) writes novels and short stories. She studied Catalan Philology at the University of Barcelona and works as a journalist and cultural manager, especially with the groups Joventuts Musicals de Barcelona and Mozartiana, as well as the la Caixa Foundation. In 2014, she reduced her work in the area of cultural management to devote herself to writing. She has worked as a cultural journalist in several media outlets, including El Periódico de Catalunya, El Temps, El Món, and El 3 de vuit.

She has published a collection of short stories titled Carnaval (La Magrana, 1987), the novels La portentosa vida del sastre Bariloche (Columna, 2011), Un concert memorable (Columna, 2014) and, inspired by a portrait of one of her ancestors painted by Joan Miró, L’home del barret (Univers, 2019), as well as the monologue Coses de la mare (2016), which was performed by the actress Montserrat Carulla. She has published Saber estar (Univers, 2021), an account of one day in the life of senyora Mascort, in the form of a walk around the Eixample neighbourhood of Barcelona, seen through the intimate gaze and surprise of a woman of the beginning of the twentieth century, and also a study of a female identity forged in the shadow of her husband, the male authority figure. Her most recent novel is La bibliotecària del front (Univers, 2023).

Her fiction presents a study of manners and mores with a plus. Set in twentieth-century Catalonia, moving between tradition and the appearance of new, disruptive elements like the appearance of Chinese textiles, the car, and the new technologies, her works are distinguished by a constant feature: irony and use of a sense of humour when dealing with tragic matters. Her books describe disappearing worlds while giving life to characters who can somehow keep going despite the changes they experience.

Berta Jardí is a member of the Associació d’Escriptors en Llengua Catalana (AELC – Association of Catalan Language Writers).

Web page: Sara Serrano for AELC.
Documentation and photographs: Author’s personal files.
Translation: Julie Wark.