Torroella reaches the peak of writers per square meter

Torroella de MontgríAn intoxicating tramontana wind for Easter is a small guilty pleasure for those of us who don't have holidays, a little house, or a little boat in Empordà. The bookseller from El Cucut in Torroella de Montgrí, Maria Teresa Calabús, invokes Fages de Climent and asks the Christ of the tramontana for that of "give the exact green to our meadow / and measure the just tramontana / that dries the grass and doesn't blow our wheat". This Thursday the Lord was magnanimous because no ES-Alert has prevented the famous literary snack of the bookstore from being held. I imagined a small Sant Jordi with family, being able to rummage through books and chat comfortably, but I find a very high ratio of writers per square meter, with the consequent buyers making it difficult to pass. Fifty-five authors and thirteen hundred homemade Lenten fritters.

I hear Sílvia Soler reciting Fages de Climent next to me because, as her mother was her disciple, they had the poem on a tile at the entrance of the house. She chats with Martí Gironell, one of the instigators of this meeting, which has become consolidated as the first pre-Sant Jordi event "without rush or aggressive queues, without authors having to go anywhere", highlights Calabús. Here the writers also don't sit down, exposed, but rather chat and readers have to intercept them on the fly. I'm looking for beef on whether the festivity is like being in a zoo, but it doesn't fly. "I resist criticizing Sant Jordi. Even with the madness of Barcelona, I find time to talk to readers. Here it's more relaxed, yes. But Sant Jordi is amazing and look, there have been times when I didn't sign much...", says Soler. Eva Piquer is also a radical fan and, obviously, the editor Pilar Beltran, who states: "Once the ordeal of the lists is overcome, all editors, small, medium and large, are delighted, at no time of the year is there so much diversity and, besides, there are as many Sant Jordis as you want; look at Jordi Coca, who is my author and decided he would no longer sign in the street". The editor Aniol Rafel nods beside him. "The book must be defended all year round, you have to go to bookstores, to clubs, wherever there are people, and then for Sant Jordi they will remember you", recommends Gironell.

I see that Regina Rodríguez Sirvent and Gil Pratsobrerroca are de-virtualizing with a hug. She confesses to me that her adrenaline is racing and she wakes up at 4 every night, but she's having fun. She assures that there is "a wonderful camaraderie" among authors: "We don't compete for the lists, it's absurd, this isn't the 100-meter dash," she says from the top of the ranking. Xavier Bosch comes incognito, because he has no new material, and admits to the bookseller that he sees next year as tight. This year he won't be at Sant Jordi in Barcelona: "When you have no new material, you're more of a nuisance than a help," opines Bosch. And he looks at Pratsobrerroca: "He'll be the best-seller," he predicts, as if he were Arturo Passing the crown. The debutant from Osona confesses that he tries not to stop and think about dizzying numbers: he already has 9 editions (50,000 copies), has sold the translation to 9 languages, and has 14 production companies interested in adapting the book. "I feel like I have a child and I'm sending him on his first camp: where will he have the most fun?" he wonders. I ask him if it will be a camp in English: "I wish it were in Catalan."

Montse Virgili appears smiling, because she sneaked onto the AVE train with a ticket for the wrong day and starred in a spy series so she wouldn't get caught, all to reach a region where there are no birds. I see familiar faces gathering: Ariadna Oltra and Elisenda Carod tell each other they haven't read each other yet, but they've heard each other promoting. "I don't feel like an intruder, I'm a journalist and I've written a portrait about journalism," Oltra tells me, who finds it revealing that we don't have newspapers at hand "not even for a calçotada," she provokes. "The end of newspapers?" Bosch half-reproaches her. "And so we go, stumbling along," she replies.

Carlota Gurt arrives distressed at 6 in the afternoon, without having eaten and in the middle of moving. Oriol Canals explains that this Holy Week he will finish the next book and deliver it precisely on Tuesday. Jordi Puntí is happy because he has sold a Maletas perdidas –the bookstore has stock from all the invited authors–, but he has dedicated himself to writing the article about his colleague's book, Stefanie Kremser: "This is the good one," he tells some customers. Rodríguez Sirvent's father has also stood next to his daughter's pile of books to promote it. "He's my salesman. He's even sold a book to Artur Mas!" the daughter celebrates. And the ARA also celebrates it every year on the cover: Sant Jordi is about reading and also about loving.