AUTHOR: Alfred Bosch
PUBLISHER: : Columna
GENRE: Fiction
READER’S NAME: Alejandro Varderi
DATE: August 3rd, 2023
This 510-page novel is an engaging meditation on the resilience of Catalan people, with Antoni Gaudi’s Sagrada Familia as its allegory. The author brings about the lives of characters behind the Cathedral’s construction, from the time of their childhood at the turn of the XX century to their adulthood in the aftermath of the Spanish Civil War.
Growing up as children of workers in the monumental project, they encountered Gaudi in their everyday escapades, treating him as a father figure. The construction of the Sagrada Familia Schools in 1909 near the site of the Basilica, granted them an education, despite the harsh living conditions in the Poblet neighborhood surrounding the monument. Violence, crime, prostitution, in the mist of poverty and ignorance, are the novel’s backdrop, and fuel the riots and brutal confrontations between the Spanish army and the Catalan people, from The Tragic Week that same year to Francisco Franco’s uprising and the Civil War.
Resentment and resistance ignited the political and bloody events, seen in the novel thru the eyes of the protagonist, one of the Sagrada Familia children named Bordegàs. The reader follows Catalonia’s history, immersing her/himself in the book’s lively dialogues and fast pathed rhythm, which mirror the audacity and dynamism of Catalan society during that period: “Havien arribat el foc i la cendra. No hi havia marxa enrere [...]. Tots passaríem pel foc, estúpids de nosaltres, i crèiem que seria ràpid. Com podíem ser tan cecs? L’única que ho captava tot era la Sagrada Família, vertiginosa per damunt dels mortals, la talaia que besava els núvols. Ella sabia que continuaria regnant enmig del patiment humà”. (“Fire and ashes had come. There was no going back [...]. We would all go through the fire, silly of us. And we thought it would be quick. How could we be so blind? The only one that seized it all was the Sagrada Familia, vertiginous above mortals, the watchtower that grazed the clouds. She knew that would continue reigning amid human suffering.”) (p. 406.)
Alfred Bosch’s El temple dels pobres recalls oeuvres by Catalan and English-speaking authors, such as George Orwell’s Homage to Catalonia (1938), Mercè Rodoreda’s La Plaça del Diamant (1962), Eduardo Mendoza’s La ciudad de los prodigios (1986), Robert Hughes’ Barcelona (1992), Carlos Ruiz Zafón’s La sombra del viento (2001) and Ildefonso Falcones’ L’esglesia del mar (2006.)
All the above have had a good reception among English-speaking readers, thus, there is a good market for Catalan historical novels of which El temple dels pobres belongs. Additionally, the Sagrada Familia is symbolic of Barcelona itself, drawing an estimated 3 million visitors annually, and capturing worldwide attention with concerts featuring from classical orchestras to pop singers and musicians.
Alfred Bosch is a well-known author, journalist, and politician. His essays and novels have been awarded important prizes such as the Joan Fuster, the Sant Jordi, the Ramon Llull, the Néstor Luján and the Prudenci Bertrana. He has taught at prestigious universities in Catalonia and abroad. He is currently Head of Institutional Relations at Harbour.Space University in Barcelona.
