Manel Pitarch Font (Vila-real, la Plana Baixa, 1966) has degrees in Catalan Philology and Spanish Literature from the University of Valencia and has worked as a secondary school and A-level teacher in Catalonia and Valencia as well as teaching in the Department of Education at the Jaume I University of Castelló. He combines his love of teaching with his work as an educational consultant in the fields of language teaching and learning and is author and co-author of teaching materials for use in the academic domain.

He is also a poet with published collections that have been awarded prizes. These noteworthy works are Trajectes del desencís (2003 Jacint Verdaguer Prize, the year of the centenary of Verdaguer’s death), Primavera entre les runes (2015 Marc Granell Prize), and Poemari per a ociosos (2017 Hibn Hazm prize awarded by the City of Xàtiva). Some of his poems have been set to music and published in anthologies.

He is co-founder of the writers’ association El Pont Cooperativa de Lletres in the Castelló region, as a member of which he contributed the story “La determinació de Kirchner” to the collective work Ponts suspensius (Onada, 2013). He is also a member of the International Association for Catalan Language and Literature (AILLC) and, moreover, is actively involved with several institutions working in the domains of language and literature in the Valencia region.

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

Documentation and texts: courtesy of the author.
Web page: Sara Serrano for AELC.
Photographs: author’s personal files.
Translation: Julie Wark.