"The torturers didn't bend me, and that's given me plenty all my life."

Barcelona"I endured the torture. I didn't speak. When we left the General Directorate of Security, my feet were black from the beatings, but I had a moment of euphoria because I hadn't said anything. None of us had spoken. The torturers broke me, and that's given me plenty all my life. If they didn't manage to break me, let's see me." An anti-Franco militant of the Revolutionary Communist League, she was tortured by Antonio González Pacheco, better known by the nickname Billy the Kid. During the 14 months she was detained in Madrid's Yeserías prison, Rius wrote and drew, which she is now publishing in book form: Drawn Memory. Yeserías Prison (1974-1975) With a prologue by Ignasi Aragay and published by L'Avenç. Neither repression nor beatings stopped her, and her resilience has served her well in many of the other struggles she has faced as an activist and militant throughout her life.

Fifty years have passed since Rius was in prison, but she hasn't forgotten anything: "I've always had a good memory of what happened. I have friends who have voids. I don't." She had notebooks, letters, books, and magazines she'd read and annotated, but above all, drawings. Most of them were made for her companion, imprisoned in Carabanchel. "With a drawing I could say much more than with a letter, and he understood everything," she says. "When I drew, I expressed many things I couldn't say in writing; sometimes it was anger, other times it was irony. I captured moments shared with my companions and what happened to me in prison," she adds.

Rius studied teaching, but devoted most of her life to drawing. Until her retirement, she was an illustrator and children's literature writer. He never abandoned his activism, even though the Trotskyist organization to which he dedicated so much was dissolved in 1991. Years ago he came into contact with Chato Galante, who died in 2020. With him and other activists he founded La Comuna, and in 2019 he launched a collective complaint against Billy the Kid (died in 2020) and other torturers. The complaint was filed.Many more have been filed, but judges have refused to investigate the torture. "At least we've gotten people talking about it again because the chances of them being brought to trial are very small," she reflects.

"Being parents made us vulnerable."

Rius devoted a great deal of energy to his cause. "We went to live in Madrid because the authorities asked us to. I was eager to have children, but we had avoided them for fear of what might happen to them if we were arrested. Being parents made us vulnerable. We made sacrifices. We fought for a democracy that has nothing to do with the one we have; we wanted it. Anti-Stalinist," he explains.

Rius was born in Raval. He was the son of eleven. His mother, trained as a teacher following the principles of Maria Montessori, homeschooled her children. She saw many shortcomings in the neighborhood, and defending the language was also important to her. "I had a good family, and my mother, despite being a woman ahead of her time, sent the boys to high school but not the girls. She thought she had to secure a future for the boys and that we girls would graduate, as she had done. All of this revolted me, even though at the time it wasn't called feminism."

She admits that in prison she felt quite alone because she was almost always the only member of the Revolutionary Communist League. "You had to be quite smart. The party was more careful with men, because there were many more of them in prison. In prison, there were many women in a small space, and living together was sometimes difficult. In addition, there were disputes between the different parties, and everything became quite complicated with the attack on Correo Street in Madrid." On September 13, 1974, there was an attack on Correo Street in Madrid, with 13 dead and 70 wounded. No one claimed responsibility for her at the time. The police, through torture, took advantage of this to accuse the Communist Party of Spain and left-wing groups, and Years later it was proven that they were not its authors.

In prison, Rius didn't want to waste time, and despite the repression, she participated in various struggles and protests. Among other things, she managed to prevent the officers from reading the prisoners' letters. Roser Rius was released from prison on December 2, 1975. The first thing she did was go to Carabanchel, where her partner was. Since then, she has participated in many more struggles: for women's rights, for migrants' rights, for improvements in her neighborhood, which is now Sants... With this book, she wanted to record everything she did and learned.