The publisher and writer Xavier Folch died on Thursday at the age of 83, as confirmed to ARA by family sources. Born in Burgos in 1938, he began his career as an editor at Ariel, was one of the founders of Crítica and together with filmmaker Pere Portabella in 1983 was the founder of Empúries, which later became part of Grup 62. The publisher Empúries has lamented his death on Twitter, defining him as a "great companion and committed editor". The news of Folch's death has elicited numerous reactions from personalities from the world of politics, such as Jordi Sànchez, the director of the literature department of the Institut Ramon Llull, Izaskun Arretxe, the writers Biel Mesquida and Josep Pedrals and the bookseller Guillem Terribas. "He was impressive for the ability he had to weave complicities in many areas", says the director of Núvol, Bernat Puigtobella, who worked with Folch at Empúries in the late 1990s and succeeded him as editor. He had the ability to convince people to do great things", recalls Puigtobella, "he encouraged Joan Solà to do great things" Gramàtica del català contemporani, """which is a masterpiece, and which came out before the Institut d'Estudis Catalans". Bernat Puigtobella also remembers seeing Folch's office as "ministers and very important people": "He was always orchestrating things, but always from the shadows. You never saw him on the front line, but behind the scenes he pulled a lot of strings".