The Movistar+ platform has premiered a magnificent BBC series. It could be considered a more adult and mature version of what Merlí intended. Waiting for the Out (The Life in the Shadow) is based on the memoirs of Andy West. The protagonist is Dan Stewer, a young philosophy professor who leaves university to teach in prison. The decision, which is incomprehensible to his brother, connects with some of his most intimate fears. The son of an abuser and a delinquent, he is one of the few men in the family who has not ended up behind bars. His father, his uncle, and his brother all spent time incarcerated. Dan is the only one who seems to have escaped a cursed inheritance. And despite everything, he resolves to enter prison in a different way. In The Life in the Shadow, the prison drama takes a back seat. The protagonist is, apparently, free. But as the episodes progress, we will question this premise. Dan will converse with the inmates about Descartes or Locke and pose existential questions to them, aiming to stimulate their thinking and reflect on their circumstances. And through his interventions, he will try to understand who his father was and why he behaved the way he did. He will confront his fears, traumas, childhood memories, and unexpressed past conflicts that make him a victim of another type of condemnation, from which he doesn't know how to escape. In this sense, the series is part of the abundant body of fiction where protagonists carry wounds due to their parents.The characters are not at all stereotyped and the dialogues with the inmates are splendid. It is not a basic philosophy Wikipedia of a wise man illustrating illiterates. The more theoretical reflections overlap with the most logical miseries of a prison: the sense of justice, consciousness, guilt, the possibility of changing or becoming a better person. “What makes you be you?”, “Is your self from ten years ago the same as who you are now?” are the first questions he shares with his students and that the viewer can also pose to themselves.Life in the shadow consists of only six chapters and, despite this, you see the characters evolve in a very natural way. In the background, it reflects on masculinity, on how family can determine our destiny or the possibilities we have of breaking with the inertias we have inherited from our parents. It is a series that, once you reach the end, you can start again, because it allows you to read the subtlest details that we had overlooked.Don't miss it, because it's one of the best options this summer, even though it's not, precisely, a very cheerful or bright story. From time to time, however, it gives you a slight smile. The series poses a reflection on freedom, which goes beyond being behind bars or not, and asks us what vital circumstances imprison and limit us, even without us realizing it.

The Dutch doctor Bernard Mandeville –translator into English of La Fontaine's fables– published in 1714 the surprising Fable of the Bees, which is, probably, the most original and famous political allegory about a beehive. It has been called the wickedest and most intelligent of all. In my opinion, it is philosophically essential reading precisely because it forces us to think against the current.It began as a long poem titled The buzzing hive or the redemption of the scoundrels, published anonymously in London in 1705. It was so remarkably successful that the author launched a second edition in a book titled The Fable of the Bees: or Private Vices, Public Benefits (1714). In 1729, the seventh edition appeared, augmented. Its thesis is bold: the origin of morality and happiness are immorality and vice. Therefore, the universalization of honesty would be the ruin of a prosperous society.Mandeville's beehive is the prosperous England of the early 18th century, envied and feared by European nations for its efficient industriousness. But on closer observation, Mandeville saw that individuals do not work motivated by the common good, but by selfishness. The common good is the result of the involuntary conjunction of individual selfish greed, vanity, luxury, envy, vice, and hypocrisy. In other words, collective prosperity is the sum of partial interests completely ignorant of the common good.The British swarm certainly lives in a cozy and spacious hive, in tranquility and abundance. Their laws and armies, their science and industry, are universally admired, and rightly so. "Never did bees know a wiser government." Their kings can do no wrong because "their power is wisely limited by laws." All that is best found in any other society is found among these bees in an excellent manner.Mandeville brings the critical focus closer to factual reality and discovers that the nation is split into two halves. The first earns a living by the sweat of their brow and their work seeks to produce everything that can satisfy the other half. But the voracity of this second half, which lives at the expense of the sweat of the naive, is insatiable. It is made up ofarrivistes, parasites, gamblers, swindlers, counterfeiters, tricksters, fortune-tellers... and sophisticated scoundrels, like the jurisconsults, who, "only intent on collecting substantial fees, do everything possible to prevent litigation from being settled by agreement." The doctors are not far behind, more attentive to their profit than to the health of their patients. There are even priests who preach restraint and moderation but are incontinent and avaricious.Inequalities can be cruel: there are war mutiles who are paid a pittance, while some cowards who never entered battle receive double pay.There is no social class that does not have a stain, but the whole enjoys "a happy prosperity" because, whatever the pretensions of the gluttons may be, it turns out that their vices contribute to public happiness, so that "even the most shameless" contribute to the common good, which is nothing other than the involuntary harmony of opposites. The temperance of some favors the excess of others; the generosity of those, the avarice of others; the luxury of the rich gives work to the poor; the self-love of each stimulates the growth of arts and commerce. In this apparently paradoxical way the hive has access to the comforts and sweetness of life.Unexpectedly, one day a tempest of puritanism arose and the bees insisted on replacing everything bad with good things. Hypocrisy, corruption, and deceit were persecuted, and they achieved such a clear social transparency that no one could hide their flaws. This was the cause of their downfall. When they managed to universalize honesty, the cheaters were left jobless; with the triumph of sobriety, those who lived by producing luxury were ruined. With the disappearance of the superfluous, the uselessness of doctors, lawyers, and judges was revealed. "No one sought novelty, no one aspired to anything. No one spent. The militia was abandoned and the hive was left defenseless".Mandeville concludes: “Vice is as necessary in a flourishing state as hunger is necessary to compel us to eat. It is impossible for virtue alone to make a nation famous and glorious”. The idea that morality can be caused by immorality fascinated Nietzsche.

Philosopher, essayist and columnist, she teaches philosophy at Sapienza Università di Roma. Donatella Di Cesare (Rome, 1956) has been fighting against the extreme right for years in all areas, including the media and the streets. She is not afraid, even though she had to have police escort due to threats received from fascist and neo-Nazi groups. Among other works, she has published Heidegger y los judíos (2017), Tortura (2018), Terrorismo. Una guerra civil global (2017), Marranos (2019) and Sobre la vocación política de la filosofía (2020), translated into Spanish by Gedisa. In Catalan, she has just published Tecnofeixisme. La suspensió tàcita de la política (Arcàdia). With translation by Coral Romà, the book reflects on how totalitarian forms of government are being imposed worldwide and how the power of the people is being reduced.

Not missing a dinner. Filling holidays with things. Fighting to get tickets to all concerts. It's been a while since this accumulation of experiences was named FOMO, fear of missing out, according to the English acronym. A way of living that has also found a reaction in those who now defend the need to do fewer things and make room for rest. They've changed the f for the j: JOMO (joy of missing out), that is, the enjoyment of missing out on something. Juan Evaristo Valls, professor of cultural philosophy at the Complutense University of Madrid, analyzes it in the book JOMO. El gusto de perder (Quaderns Anagrama). 

After publishing a few years ago A philosophy of fear, finalist for the Anagrama Essay Prize in 2021Bernat Castany Prado, philosopher and philologist, professor of literature at the UB, returns to bookstores with another delightful and highly recommended essay. A philosophy of laughterOnce again, we find an author who writes with a good rhythm, in an exuberant style, full of imagery, metaphors, and stylistic turns, yet maintains due restraint regarding the rigor of his ideas. The wit that characterizes the writing in this book is not exhausted by mere fireworks, but rather serves a way of life. Reading Professor Castany makes us better.

When Francesc Torralba (Barcelona, ​​1967) began teaching philosophy at the university, only five years older than his students. "Now I'm almost forty years older than them," he explains. "One of the changes between then and now is that I currently observe very high levels of disenchantment among students, both in the classroom and in tutorials." Torralba's new essay, Anatomy of Hope —which won the 2026 Josep Pla Prize—, stems from the unease he has observed in society in recent years, particularly affecting young people. "They are constantly bombarded with negative messages," the author continues. "They are told they will have precarious contracts, that they will never be able to buy a 60-square-meter apartment."² in Barcelona, ​​and that they will experience relationships marked by volatility." Adding to the negativity about the future is the media's portrayal of the present. "The news and newspapers tell us that both the local and global worlds are falling apart," he adds. "He has attempted suicide twice, what do I tell him?" he asks.

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With the death of dictator Francisco Franco on November 20, 1975, Catalan society awoke from a nightmare. It had long been brimming with expectations and dynamism. But until the death of leader The latent energies did not fully erupt. This was also true in the cultural world.

Marxist, environmentalist, and proponent of degrowth: these are the three pillars of the thought of Japanese philosopher Kohei Saito (Tokyo, 1987), who, thanks to essays highly critical of capitalism such as Slow down. A new way of living (2020; in Catalan in Tigre de Paper) has become best-seller —has sold over half a million copies in Japan alone— and has been translated into some twenty languages. The author recently visited the CCCB in Barcelona with a new book, Capital from scratch (Paper Tiger, 2025; translated by Lola Fígols), where he analyzes the growing discrediting of capitalist logic, puts forward some proposals to correct the present and offers an unusual look at Karl Marx's most important work, The capital

The other day I was reflecting on the strength and fragility of the human being, or rather, the human body. Because, even for a non-believer, it's undeniable that our anatomy is absolutely marvelous. You only have to stop for a moment and observe how we function to realize what a miracle it is to be alive. We automatically breathe, self-regulate, eliminate what harms us, our heart beats regularly, and our immune system fights for us. All of this without us having to be aware of it. It's a technology so advanced that no human machine can fully match it. And all of this happens inside us, constantly, every second.

We took advantage of the heatwave and talked about philosophy.

Throughout almost six decades of awards, the Honorary Prize for Catalan Literature has distinguished narrators, poets, linguists, singer-songwriters and historians, but until now it had not recognized anyone who had dedicated his life to philosophy as Pere Lluís FontLluís's intellectual contribution has been deployed, broadly speaking, on four levels: university teaching, translation, publishing, and writing. "To think is to rethink." "Catalonia and philosophy have been my two passions." "We are monolingual, but it suits us to be polyglots." These have been three of the award winner's mottos throughout his long and fruitful career.

"Philosophy has two main motives: to be outraged at transforming the world and to marvel at perseverance." The phrase uttered by Begoña Roman, a doctor of philosophy and professor at the University of Barcelona (UB), is a good example of why, on a Monday afternoon, nearly 100 people gathered at the Ateneu Barcelonès with a clear objective: to restore the prestige of philosophy in Catalan education. "It's no longer a professional issue but a national issue. The problem is that we live in a short-termist way. We don't plan for the future, but only for today," criticized philosophy professor Ramon Moix.

At the exhibition In the moved air... French philosopher and art historian Georges Didi-Huberman (Saint-Étienne, 1953) proposes taking a critical step back and stopping to read, allowing images to move us, but also to ask us questions. He does this by following in the footsteps of some of Lorca's verses and through three hundred works by artists such as Goya, Dalí, Giacometti, Miró, Picasso, Colita, and Rodin. The exhibition, which begins and ends with the gaze of children, is a co-production of the CCCB, where it can be seen until September 28, and the Museo Reina Sofía in Madrid, where he was present last year. Didi-Huberman has a long body of work dedicated to the uses and meanings of images and has never tiptoed around some highly controversial topics.. Among his works are: Images despite everything (2004; Images despite everything: visual memory of the Holocaust in the Spanish edition of Paidós), When images take position (2008; When images take position to Antonio Machado Books) and Passer, what is the cost? (2017; Pass, whatever the cost in Shangrila)

It's pouring rain, just when you think it's over again, the never-ending story—first as tragedy, then as farce—and we're back at the top of the heap. Or to put it another way: Sisyphus in the race after the stone that goes up and down and never stops rolling, but in this case only down and never up. I say this because Catalonia has been the country with the least emphasis on philosophy in the educational curriculum for a long time, blow after blow. And if we've been here for so long, it means we've been in a worse place for years. From the school of freedom, it's always urgent to think—against those who only want us to be subjects, consumers, spectators, and users—and rethink everything. Because if today, for example, is April 25th—with Valencian roots, a Portuguese soul, and an Italian partisan spirit—we will have to consider why we have the Valencian Country we have, what has become of the democratic revolution of the carnations fifty years later, and how the hell we ended up in the sinister state of Liberation with Meloni governing Italy. It makes us think—not so much. Because they have also been inviting, inciting, and clumsily modulating us to stop doing so for too long.

"In the age of machines, perhaps we should think about this: humans know things and so do machines, but they don't know them the way humans know them, although, depending on how, they know them better. The fact is that it's not just what is known that's important, but also how it is known," wrote philosopher Josep Maria Terricabras in his book Dare to think, published in 1998. Artificial intelligence was not yet being discussed, but the thinker was already advocating the need for tools and aids to think better and reflected on the "usefulness of rigorous thinking in everyday life," as the book's subtitle stated. It was this book that inspired the awards named after Manel Xifra Boada, founder of Comexi, one of the largest companies in Catalonia, a world leader in the flexographic printing machinery construction sector, which today exports 90% of its production, with an annual turnover of more than 100 million euros.

Marina Garcés (Barcelona, ​​​​1973) says that the first impact of a strange friendship is the film ET., which she saw when she was nine years old. "It radically raises the question of where unconditional love lies with a different being, in this case so bizarre that it's literally extraterrestrial." A friendship between a child and a chili pepper from another planet confronts you with a question: what does it mean to love unconditionally? This is one of the questions the Catalan philosopher poses. in his latest book, The passion of strangers (Galaxia Gutenberg).

I recently asked Ferran Sáez about his relationship with spirituality, and he pointed to an inconspicuous window located high above the room we were in. It was a gray day, natural light weakening against the artificial, and on the windowsill was a sparrow taking advantage of the building's shapes to shelter from the rain. "I could put a barrier between what we're doing here and that sparrow, between me and the world, but I choose not to," he said. We were in an auditorium at the Casa de Convalescencia, a jewel of Catalan Baroque civil architecture that serves as the headquarters for the Institut d'Estudis Catalans, at the end of a symposium dedicated to celebrating Sáez as a "contemporary classic" and deepening our understanding of his work. After four hours of academic presentations, on the periphery of a bubble of human achievement, the rest of the world continued to spin with a labored and calm indifference. It's one of those images that makes you look at yourself from the outside, and in that shift in perspective, you consider the possibility that there's something genuinely important beyond yourself.

Pere Lluís Font (Pujalt, 1934), historian of philosophy, at the age of 91 maintains an enviable lucidity and intellectual vitality. A teacher of several generations of philosophers, he has just published the Catalan translation of the Essential poems (Excerpt) by Saint John of the Cross, which have a mystical and erotic interpretation. And he concludes the essay Philosophy in nature (UB), "a text that is not at all emphatic, without makeup or rhetoric", like three of the great authors who have always accompanied him: Montaigne, Descartes and Pascal. In fact, his last major contribution (2021) has been the monumental translation into Catalan of the Thoughts Pascal, winner of the National Translation Prize and the Catalan PEN Club Prize.

Knowing what truth and lies mean in a world invaded by fake news. Understanding that "generalizations are often fallacies" at a time when many are talking too loudly. And engaging in dialogue in a divided world. "Understanding that polarization is avoided when you can tolerate disagreeing with your friend and still be their friend." Philosophy teachers argue that the subject they teach goes far beyond the myths and theories of the classics. It allows students to "think," "doubt," "self-criticize," and "question everything." These values and lessons they believe are "fundamental" in today's society and that adolescents cannot properly acquire because they dedicate too few hours to it. "We need time to think," says Laia Cos, who acts as a spokesperson for these teachers.