Oriol Pi de Cabanyes (Vilanova i la Geltrú, Garraf, 1950) is a novelist and essayist.

At an early age, seventeen to be precise, he won first prize in the first Serra d’Or "Call to Young Writers" completion, while at the age of twenty-three he was awarded the Prudenci Bertrana Prize for his debut novel Oferiu flors als rebels que fracassaren (Offer Flowers to the Rebels Who Failed, 1973), a work that also received the Serra d'Or Critics' Prize for the Novel in 1974. This novel is significant in constituting a portrait of young people of the time. Oriol Pi de Cabanyes combines his work as a writer with teaching and among his novels are També les formigues, Dylan, algun dia ploraran de solitud (The Ants Too, Dylan, Will Cry of Loneliness Some Day), a finalist for the 1975 Josep Pla Prize, and Esquinçalls d'una bandera (Tatters of a Flag, 1977), a finalist for the 1976 Sant Jordi Prize. He has also published the short story collection Novenari d'ànimes (Novena of Souls, 1978).

As an essayist, Oriol Pi de Cabanyes has published La generació literària dels 70 (The '70s Literary Generation, 1971), which is co-authored with Guillem-Jordi Graells, and, as a specialist in the nineteenth century, La Renaixença (The Catalan Renaissance, 1978), Apunts d'història de la Renaixença (Notes on the History of the Catalan Renaissance, 1984) and Repensar Catalunya (Rethinking Catalonia, 1989). With this latter work he received the Josep Vallverdú Prize for the Essay in 1988. Notable, too, in his extensive oeuvre is the diary Llibre d'hores (1975-1978) (Book of Hours (1975 – 1978), 1980) and the book of travel writing Pel bell nord glaçat (Through the Beautiful Frozen North), for which he received the Sant Joan Prize in 1995.

A regular contributor to such publications as Serra d'Or, Avui and La Vanguardia, Oriol Pi de Cabanyes has also been director of the Víctor Balaguer Museum of Vilanova i la Geltrú, the Institute of Catalan Letters, the Catalan Government's Department of Culture and the Catalan Consortium for Promotion of Catalan Culture Abroad.

He was a board member of the Associació d'Escriptors en Llengua Catalana (Association of Catalan Language Writers) from 1978 to 1980.



Web page: Toni Terrades Oliver for AELC.
Documentation: Oriol Pi de Cabanyes and Teresa Costa-Gramunt.
Photographs: Author's personal files.