Manuel Rivas – författare

It is the summer of 1936, the early months of the agonising civil war that engulfs Spain and shakes the rest of the world. In a prison in the pilgrim city of Santiago de Compostela, an artist sketches the famous porch of the cathedral, the Portico da Gloria. He uses a carpenter's pencil. But instead of reproducing the sculptured faces of the prophets and elders, he draws the faces of his fellow Republican prisoners. Many years later in post-Franco Spain, a survivor of that period, Doctor Daniel da Barca, returns from exile to his native Galicia, and the threads of past memories begin to be woven together. This poetic and moving novel conveys the horror and savagery of the tragedy that divided Spain, and the experiences of the men and women who lived through it. Yet in the process, it also relates one of the most beautiful love stories imaginable.

On 19 August 1936 Hercules the boxer stands on the quayside at Coruña and watches Fascist soldiers piling up books and setting them alight. With this moment a young carefree group of friends are transformed into a broken generation. Out of this incident during the early months of Spain's tragic civil war, Manuel Rivas weaves a colourful tapestry of stories and unforgettable characters to create a panorama of twentieth-century Spanish history. For it is not only the lives of Hercules the boxer and his friends that are tainted by the unending conflict, but also those of a young washerwoman who sees souls in the clouded river water and the stammering son of a judge who uncovers his father's hidden library.As the singed pages fly away on the breeze, their stories live on in the minds of their readers.

A glorious cast of animals and birds, as well as humans, relate the magical stories that form the plot of Manuel Rivas's extraordinary novel. An old lady, Misia, tells how the 300 ravens of Xallas are the warrior-poets of the last King of Galicia. A priest, Don Xil, explains to a peasant girl, Rosa, that the beautifully carved women in the local church are not saints, but represent the seven deadly sins. A mouse, Matac-ns, a poacher in his previous life, is chased by a cat, the bagpiper and anarchist, Arturo of Lousame. A bat, Gaspar, relates his own death to a lizard. In a nearby cellar, half the parish are found to have transmigrated into spiders, snails, toads-Manuel Rivas's story emerges like spirals of smoke, in a series of memorably poetic images. His characters have their roots deep in the traditions, legends and history of his beloved Galicia. Few contemporary storytellers share his power of vision and sense of cultural identity, or can narrate their tales with such tenderness and humour.

Manuel Rivas delivers a literary masterpiece about three young friends growing up in a community which is bound by a conspiracy of silenceFins and Brinco are best friends, and they both adore the wild and beautiful Leda. The three young friends spend their days exploring the dunes and picking through the treasures that the sea washes on to the shores of Galicia. One day, as they are playing in the abandoned school on the edge of the village, they come across treasure of another kind: a huge cache of whisky hidden under a sheet. But before they can exploit their discovery a shot rings out, and a man wearing an impeccable white suit and panama hat enters the room. That day they learn the most important lesson of all, that the mouth is for keeping quiet.

It is the summer of 1936, the early months of the agonising civil war that engulfs Spain and shakes the rest of the world. In a prison in the pilgrim city of Santiago de Compostela, an artist sketches the famous porch of the cathedral, the Portico da Gloria. He uses a carpenter's pencil. But instead of reproducing the sculptured faces of the prophets and elders, he draws the faces of his fellow Republican prisoners. Many years later in post-Franco Spain, a survivor of that period, Doctor Daniel da Barca, returns from exile to his native Galicia, and the threads of past memories begin to be woven together. This poetic and moving novel conveys the horror and savagery of the tragedy that divided Spain, and the experiences of the men and women who lived through it. Yet in the process, it also relates one of the most beautiful love stories imaginable.

Manuel is growing up in Franco's Spain. He adores his elder sister, María, and they are watched over by their mother, who enjoys reciting poetry, and their father, a construction worker with vertigo. Beyond the walls of the house, he encounters chatty hairdressers and priests, wolf hunters and monstrous carnival effigies.The community is still haunted by the civil war, yet Manuel's world is changing. Coca-Cola opens a factory nearby and news arrives of men landing on the moon. This is a story about family, memory and the experiences that make us who we are.

Many readers outside Spain do not know that the acclaimed novelist, Manuel Rivas, is a significant poet in his homeland, writing in his native Galician. This volume redresses the balance, offering a bilingual edition of his 2009 collection A desaparicion da neve, which, in an unusal move, was published in four national languages under one set of covers-Galician, Castilian, Catalan and Basque.

For Manuel Rivas, words are the most sensitive of creatures. In the same way that frogs or glow-worms are the first to manifest signs of pollution in the natural environment, words suffer as a result of corruption in the socio-political sphere. In his work as journalist, writer of fiction, poetry or essays, he is consistent in his role as custodian of all sensitive creatures; his writings document historical damage and alert us to potential future harm to our natural, linguistic and political eco-systems."Rivas is, without doubt, the most important figure (and the best known) in contemporary Galician literature [...]. His fictions bear the tone of an oral tale."-Alberto Manguel"Manuel Rivas is an important storyteller because he is sensitive and has an incredible ear, which, in his fiction, is allied to great integrity."-John Berger"Rivas is an indisputable classic" -The Scotsman"An author who knows how to introduce poetry, not only in his phrasing, but also in his way of seeing the world." - Raphaelle Rerolle, Le Monde

ARTE Y DEMOCRACIA nace como resultado de la decisión de los artistas, que en enero de 2022 formaban parte del Consejo de Administración de VEGAP, de convocar un encuentro público para tratar el papel que hoy en día juega el hecho artístico en las sociedades abiertas. La base de este encuentro era tratar dos ideas fundamentales: por una parte, la defensa de la actividad artística en las sociedades democráticas; y, por otra, la defensa de los derechos de autor de los creadores visuales ante las rá- pidas y agresivas transformaciones socio-económicas de la actual sociedad digitalizada y globalizada.El Derecho de autor, producto de la Revolución francesa y de la Ilustración, está inserto en el corazón mismo de la DEMOCRACIA moderna y bajo las amenazas de las transformaciones de la actual sociedad tecnológica. La responsabilidad pública sobre el Patrimonio afecta también al reconocimiento de los artistas como generadores de PATRIMONIO CONTEMPORÁNEO. Una sociedad democrática es una creación social de aportaciones libres que encuentra en los autores su expresión más activa. El ARTE es un hecho social, tiene una dimensión colectiva que materializa los emblemas de las metamorfosis y cambios de época.

O lapis do carpinteiro e unha historia de amor, melancolia e liberdade. Un grande amor en tempo de guerra e posguerra que chega aos nosos dias entre Marisa Mallo, unha fermosa moza de Fronteira, filla dunha familia reaccionaria, e o medico republicano Daniel Da Barca, posuidor da beleza tisica e seguidor da teoria da realidade intelixente do doutor Novoa Santos. Fronte a eles, a mirada escrutadora dun home que non tina medo, Herbal, o garda da cadea da Falcona que vera restaurada a sua condicion de ser humano por obra e graza de tantas formas de amor como o lapis do carpinteiro lle foi ensinando a debuxar. O lapis do carpinteiro e testemuno dunha traxedia curativa, unha metafora de todas as guerras, unha loita contra o esquecemento que demostra o poder salvifico do amor. Esta excepcional novela ficara no lector gravada coma un engrama, coma o suco dunha cicatriz que rescata o mellor da nosa memoria. A novela galega con mais traducions a outras linguas. 100.000 exemplares vendidos en galego. Un fito e referente ineludible da nosa literatura. Premio da Critica Espanola, Premio Arcebispo Xoan de San Clemente, Premio da AELG, Premio Literario 50 aniversario da seccion belga de Amnistia Internacional.

The Last Days of Terranova tells of "Vicenzo Fontana", the elderly owner of the long-standing Terranova Bookstore, on the day its set to close due to the greed of real-estate speculators. On this final day, he spends the night in his beloved store filled with more than seventy years of fugitive histories. Jumping from the present to various points in the past, the novel ferries us back to his childhood, when his father first opened the store, to the years that the store was run by his Uncle "Eliseo", and to the years in the lead-up to the democratic transition, which Vicenzo spent as far away from the bookstore as possible, in Madrid. Like the bookstore itself, The Last Days of Terranova is a space crammed with stories, histories, and literary references, and as many nooks, crannies, and complexities, brought to life in Rivass vital prose.