Mishima completed their first Olympic cycle of La Nit de les Roses this Wednesday. It has been four years since they were the first band to perform at the historic La Paloma venue in the heart of Barcelona's Raval after its renovation, and they did so by proposing a pre-Sant Jordi party that fuses words and music, as befits the most literary band on the contemporary Catalan scene. As Manuel de Pedrolo said, if they are roses, they will bloom. And these have burst forth proudly: if seeing them chanting Mishima's songs and the applause for the writers who acted as openers are the barometer, this is a tradition that has come to stay. 

The Mishimas completed their first Olympic cycle of La Nit de les Roses this Wednesday. They have already In times of fear for the future of Catalan, David Carabén sent an optimistic message: “Our language is in good enough shape that we had to go over it a few times these days to select authors”. The lineup was certainly a luxury. Opening the proceedings was the latest recipient of the Premi d'Honor de les Lletres Catalanes, the poet Biel Mesquida, who torrentially recited the last three pieces from his latest book, Trast

"Can I live with you again in the years we didn't share?" the narrator asks. Relic, third book that Polo Guasch (Tarragona, 1997) published by Anagrama. For the first time in his career, narrator and author coincide, and it is Pol himself who poses this question, addressed to his father. Relic It begins with the impact of his suicide on January 13, 2013, when he was only 44 years old, and from there it is his son who tries to understand an action that marked a before and after in his family. It is the first time that the author of Napalm in the heart (Anagrama, 2021) and Offered in your hands, the cream paradise (Anagrama, 2024) publicly addresses such a complex and delicate private matter, but succeeds thanks to the transformative power that good literature sometimes possesses.

This year he has read a lot and he hates recommending just one book, but there was one that left its mark on him: I gave you eyes and you looked into the darkness, by Irene Solà. "It has a completely different style than what I have been reading lately," explains Vicenç Calafell, one of the three members of the musical group HadasThe novel tells the story of a lineage of women who live in a farmhouse and explores a world made of myths, superstitions, and fables.