"I love you and this is a cry for help. I love you and that is a let's do it together, please". These are the two opening sentences of We dreamed of an island, the novel with which Roc Casagran (Sabadell, 1980) has won the 2024 Sant Jordi Award. These are phrases that give an indication of what the novel will be like: they establish the narrative and stylistic coordinates – a realism with poetic tones –, they mark its ethical and ideological orientation – in humanism with utopian echoes – and on the surface.

Roc Casagran (Sabadell, 1980) has been publishing books for more than half his life. He debuted as a poet with The streets of the factories (Vienna, 2002), thanks to the Martí Dot award from Sant Feliu, and 22 years later – during which he has published fifteen more titles – he has received the Sant Jordi award thanks to We dreamed of an island, published this week by Univers and Òmnium. The novel is the first-person account of a documentary filmmaker, Carla, who addresses her partner, Óscar, at a delicate moment in his life: mourning for the death of his mother. This is the starting point of a story that intertwines the intimacy of three generations of the same family and explores stories and anecdotes from various islands that are thematically or metaphorically connected to the narrative material of the book.