Manuel de Pedrolo (L'Aranyó, 1918 - Barcelona, 1990). Novelist, playwright, poet and translator.

He was one of the most prolific writers in contemporary Catalan literature. He worked in all literary genres and contributed articles, stories and essays to the majority of Catalan reviews of his time. He published more than a hundred works, mainly in prose, with works such as Cendra per Martina (Ash by Martina) and Totes les bèsties de càrrega (All the Beasts of Burden) and the cycle of novels Temps obert (Open Time). The novel Mecanoscrit del segon origen (Manuscript of the Second Origen) was one of the most widely-read books during the 1970s. Censorship during the Franco dictatorship partly conditioned his career. The first editions of his work were systematically cut and ten entire books were prohibited. He was a highly versatile writer, and also translated works by John Dos Passos, Jean-Paul Sartre and William Faulkner, amongst others, and was also director of the collection of detective novels La Cua de Palla. He received several literary prizes, amongst them the distinction of the 1979 Award of Honour in Catalan Letters.

He was a member of Associació d'Escriptors en Llengua Catalana (Association of Catalan Language Writers) which, between 1984 and 1989 awarded the Mecanoscrit literary prize for young writers.

Read here fragments of his work translated into English.



Documentation: Emili Gil.
Updated by Carme Ros.
Translated by Julie Wark.
Photographs: © archive of de Pedrolo family.