Biblioteca Virtual de Defensa/Wikimedia Commons, CC BY Nada was written in the early days of the Franco regime. The dictatorship of General Francisco Franco, whose rebel armies had ultimately vanquished the left-wing Republicans, would drag on until his death in 1975. Nada, which in Spanish means “nothing”, emerged in one of the darkest and most stagnant periods of Spanish history.įor many Spaniards - already exhausted from the brutal Civil War that ripped the country apart between 19 - their worst nightmare had become a crushing, everyday reality. Censorship and stagnation after the Civil War The scowling maid, Antonia, lurks in the shadows with her dog, relishing the violence. Andrea’s tiny, tremulous grandmother tries to keep the peace, recalling how “there were never two brothers who loved each other like Román and Juanito”. Juan can be found either beating Gloria or painting bad nudes of her to sell for a pittance. If Gloria gets involved, Juan turns on her. Andrea’s arrogant artistic uncle Román goads his hot-headed brother, Juan, usually about his “piece of trash” wife, Gloria, who Román claims is obsessed with him. Every day, the same violent dramas recur. Arriving at her grandparents’ crumbling apartment, Andrea enters “what seemed like a nightmare”: a ragged array of relatives teetering between madness and starvation.Īndrea’s grandfather is dead and the household is under the command of her authoritarian aunt, Angustias, who promises to “mould” Andrea into obedience. Instituto Cervantes (Leeds).Once glorious, Barcelona is now defeated and dilapidated, “its silence vivid with the respiration of a thousand souls behind darkened balconies”.

Registered attendees will receive the link to the sessions by email.įollowing the indications of the local authorities, the Instituto Cervantes in Leeds has closed its facilities and we have moved our activity to the Internet (web and social networks). The sessions will be hosted through Zoom. His research interests include the Spanish Generation of 1950, the theory of the diaries, colonialism and the development of identity in literature.

In it he analyzes the construction of identity, especially homosexuality, colonialism and disease, in the diaries of Jaime Gil de Biedma, under the supervision of leading academics Richard Cleminson and Duncan Wheeler. He is working on a Master's research project at the University of Leeds. The tutor of the Reading Club, Álvaro González Montero, has a degree in Translation and Language studies (English, French and Arabic) from the University of Malaga and teaches Spanish at a secondary school in Leeds.

Nada by carmen laforet in english