"I suffered a perfectly planned mutilation, that of my language, and that's why I speak and write without any problem in Spanish. I don't regret mastering this language, but I can't ignore why I master it. If I write in Catalan, it's because I learned it on my own; nobody ever taught me; what's more, nobody ever speaks to me." With such forceful words—behind which one can sense long prior reflections—he expresses himself from time to time. Pedro Rovira (Vila-seca de Solcina, 1947) in his last and highly recommended diary, Life and Illusions (Proa, 2025). "If I had to bite my tongue in a book like this, I'd be better off not having written it," acknowledges the author, who has dedicated the last fifteen years, the most prolific of his career, to a threefold activity: that of making memories—through the cycle of diaries, inaugurated with Vermeer's Window (Proa, 2016) – that of continuing to cultivate poetry – with volumes such as The game of Venus (Proa, 2021)—and that of translating, with such outstanding projects as the one of The Flowers of Evil, of Charles Baudelaire (Proa, 2021).

We like to emphasize the fact that Pere Rovira is an excellent writer, undoubtedly one of the best writing in Catalan today. He recently published, with the Proa publishing house, the volume Life and Illusions, a new installment of his diaries, which include milestones of autobiographical literature such as Daily without days (2004), Vermeer's Window (2016) and Music and pulse (2019). Rovira is also an excellent poet, as evidenced in the volume of his collected poems. Today is always (2022), and in each of his books of verse, which he composes slowly, at intervals. One must also read the two novels he has published so far (Crazy love, from 2007, and The Father's Wars(from 2013). And his translations from French are a joy: Ronsard (Ronsard's Roses), 2009), Baudelaire (The Flowers of Evil, 2021) or the anthology French garden. From Villon to Rimbaud (2016). Without prejudice to the work, let's say youth (the books of poems collected in the volume Poetry 1979-2004)It can be said that the best of Pere Rovira's writing, born in 1947, has been known since his fifties.