<![CDATA[Ara Balears in English - Sebastià Portell]]> 10 <![CDATA[They will be the young]]> Fifteen, perhaps? Twenty, at most? I haven't had a minimally documented and well-founded political consciousness for that many years, but I can't recall any time when the country's spirits have been so low. I lived through the eruption of social movements on Twitter, including the indignados; I participated as much as I could and more in the spectacular response of island society to the linguistic extermination attempts by the Government of José Ramón Bauzá; I witnessed, as a distant observer, the orange joy of the Valencian spring, and not many years ago I beat with the Catalan autumn and the self-determination referendum, the anti-repressive movement afterwards... And now? Where are we now, that the citizens of the Catalan Countries seem to be so discouraged?Everything indicates that the country is experiencing a moment of hangover from what we could have been or achieved and that could not be. And I'm not just referring to the independence of the Principality, which would have been a magnificent first step towards the constitution of a federal republic among the different Catalan Countries, but also to the progressive ideas proposed by the governments of the Valencian Country and the Balearic Islands which, whether due to a lack of consensus among the forces that composed them, or due to a lack of courage and decisiveness in moving forward, were not consolidated. The social use of the language seems to be at an all-time low, political debate is eaten away from top to bottom by hatred and resentment, and suddenly, in Mallorca and the Principality, two new supposedly self-centered forces (in Valencia, Vox is already in charge...) have begun to defend right and wrong the same exclusionary discourses of the global far-right.Something, however, tells me that there is hope, and that this time hope will come from one of the groups most judged and doubted throughout all time: those who will save the language (that is to say, the country) will be the young people. After the generation of heroes who in the seventies and eighties fought to establish our own laws and institutions that we still preserve today, and the subsequent wave of the 'baby boomers', who with all due love I say, thought they had paid for everything and now see that they haven't, a new batch of young people with drive has erupted throughout the territory. Initiatives like Acampallengua, not many days ago in Manacor, or the Correllengua Agermanat, which youth organizations from all over the linguistic domain have launched thanks to the spur and meeting point that has been the New Congress of Catalan Culture, make me think so. Or Sant Jordi per la Llengua, with demonstrations in different cities of the Principality, organized in large part, also, by organizations and unions led by youth.Yes: perhaps they, them, and him will be. They will do it from self-esteem and love for diversity, online or in assembly or in rounds of folk dance, and the others will not always understand them. The important thing, however, is that there is a generation that does not intend to give up, and with that, often, it is enough to start again.

]]> <![CDATA[Vox: fleas bite]]> It should not surprise anyone that the party that has accumulated the most internal crises in the Balearic Islands since the beginning of the legislature (between splits, cross-accusations, and dissenting votes) is now going through its own ordeal at the state level. Let it be known that I do not use this Easter and Christian expression for nothing: what Vox is experiencing these weeks is the explosion of an escalation that its democratic tradition (sic) has precipitated since they began to torpedo the Spanish party map. Who could have imagined that a force so open to reflection, so fond of complexities, so enamored of individual liberties and dialogue would end up sinking on all fronts? Who would have said that the party of bracelets with the flag of the Empire and the 'fachalecos' (perhaps in Catalan we could call them 'fatxapits'...) would end up having serious internal problems due to a lack of debate and consensus?The electoral results in the recent elections in Aragón, Castilla y León, and Extremadura might suggest that the party is in top form, but its internal reality is very different. While the respective regional formations struggle to influence or enter these governments, it seems that numerous militants and founders of the far-right party would be trying to force an extraordinary congress to put an end to Santiago Abascal's leadership (that gentleman who for decades has denounced the vices of the political caste without ever having worked at anything else, yes, the man with chest hair who skipped military service), while, in parallel, the Justice system is investigating two high-ranking party officials accused of revealing secrets.In the Islands, meanwhile, the PSIB a few days ago made yet another attempt to remove Gabriel Le Senne from the position of President of the Parliament, a position he has not been worthy of since the PP granted it to him. They accused him, in fact, of being like his party: contrary to the plurality and neutrality that should mark the exercise of this position and, ultimately, complicit in extending and legitimizing the discourses and values that allow homophobic aggressions like the one suffered a few days ago by a teacher at the IES Baltasar Porcel in Andratx (an aggression that the Parliament has condemned in its entirety, without the vote of Vox). The PP, however, preferred to ignore the socialists' offer and keep in office the one who tore up the portrait of Aurora Picornell, a woman imprisoned, tortured, and murdered by the supporters of a dictatorship that neither the PP nor Vox have ever condemned.A few years ago, following a personal disappointment, a good friend told me that sometimes some people are also fleas, and fleas, as you know... Fleas bite. Thus, it is no surprise that the party that has sown discord and intolerance, those who have stirred up political debate even before having representation in any parliament, are now drinking their own medicine and attacking each other. If it weren't for the pathetic nature of it, it would even be a pleasure to watch.

]]> <![CDATA[Mesquidian Letters Honorary Award]]>

"Will I be able to say your name, disheveled boy, now that you have been awarded the Catalan Letters of Honor prize?"

]]> <![CDATA[Sleep in our house]]> It is healthy and necessary, but it can also be traumatic or complicated: there comes a time in life when the term 'ca nostra' begins to feel uncertain.

]]> <![CDATA[It's the cyclists' fault]]> "It's all the Jews' and the cyclists' fault." This slogan, coined by Joseph Goebbels, propaganda minister of the Third Reich, is still studied today in communication and political science departments as a clear example of a false dichotomy. It is said that Goebbels presented the idea to Hitler in the midst of the frenzy of anti-Semitic targeting and persecution, and that Hitler responded with what many of you might have thought, given the context: "And why the cyclists?"

]]> <![CDATA[A new moment for sovereignty]]> Good news is also coming from the Valencian Community. A few days ago, an internal Compromís poll was published, confirming a trend already emerging in other stateless nations of the Iberian Peninsula: pro-independence parties could be the alternative to the PP and Vox governments. The fact that the poll shows a four-way tie between Compromís (25-26 seats), Vox (25-26), the PSPV (24-25), and the PP (24-25) undoubtedly reflects a significant tectonic shift. On the one hand, there's the reaction of Valencian society to Mazón's disastrous handling of the torrential rains. On the other, there's the lack of leadership in the PSPV, which is too preoccupied with "preventing further glories for Spain" from within the ministerial sphere. Can this map help us envision a new horizon for the Balearic Islands?

]]> <![CDATA[United States of Europe]]> It's not a new idea, but today it makes more sense than ever: has the time come for a United States of Europe? In a context of constant geopolitical friction, with the United States unleashed in its neocolonial offensive, a militarily weak Russia yet ready to undermine all the non-aggression pacts established at the end of the Cold War, and a China that is quietly growing and expanding both within and beyond its borders, the global context is complex, and I can think of few solutions more surprisingly feasible and appropriate today than this one.

]]> <![CDATA[Crosses and cracks]]> We live in times of crux and fissures in life and geopolitics. The Greenland episode—and Venezuela—reminds us just how uncertain everything is and how easily it can change at any moment. In parallel, these days in our own country we have also seen how infrastructure only truly 'exists' when it fails—especially due to the (far) right. The Adamuz train accident has left more than forty dead, with high-speed rail traffic disrupted and an entire country in a state of shock.

]]> <![CDATA[Sensitive matter]]> "Without knowing exactly how, you end up with a house overflowing with water": that's how it begins The magnet and thingsThe unclassifiable first book by artist, teacher, and philologist Mateu Coll (Pollença, 1962). Not surprisingly, objects and the idea of collecting (or accumulating) are some of the central themes of the volume, which explores the relationship we have with the things we own or want. "You go after them, the searches, the objects," says Coll. "I've bought and collected like crazy, as if the world were ending, an ark in the middle of a flood, a pair and more of every kind." And so he draws us into a discourse that oscillates between a highly personal memoir and an essay, between deeply personal thought and almost poetic prose.

]]> <![CDATA[Aloud]]> What space are we willing to reserve for the voices of others? In a world moving toward individualism, where people listen to each other less and less, spoken or felt words can be a balm against isolation and a lack of empathy, a way to step outside of oneself. I was thinking about this the other day, after attending the complete reading of the Same as the shooting genre, by Miquel Àngel Adrover Perelló, in the Vella de Calonge church, organized by the poet, narrator, playwright and conspirator Joan Tomàs Martínez Grimalt and by the poet and cultural dealer Pau Vadell y Vallbona.

]]> <![CDATA[Anti-politics]]> Almost halfway through this legislative term, it seems the Balearic Islands have become, as has already happened with regions like the Valencian Community, Andalusia, Extremadura, and Murcia, a testing ground for the anti-politics that is looming at the national level. Or, in other words: the reality that arises when a liberal or conservative party, with a democratic bent like the PP claims, comes to need the votes of anti-establishment and far-right parties, with populist and anti-constitutional rhetoric, such as Vox. Few institutions are spared, and the Balearic Islands Government, the Council of Mallorca, and the Palma City Council serve as unfortunate examples of this.

]]> <![CDATA[Mallorca in transition]]> Sometimes there are books that are ahead of their time, or that, without being ahead of their time, capture the spirit of an entire era. They can even help us imagine future, or better, ones. This is the feeling I had with this novel. Monument, by Alba Noguera (Palma, 1997), winner of the VIII Antoni Vidal Ferrando Prize and published by the Calongí label Adia Edicions.

]]> <![CDATA[Mystic without a soul]]> It has been the best debut in history for a Spanish-speaking artist, with over forty-two million streams on Spotify worldwide. Mainstream critics praised her, audiences soared with every interview she gave, and even the Prime Minister of Spain, Pedro Sánchez, congratulated her for being "the third most listened-to artist" globally for a few days. But what makes the success of Rosalía's new album so remarkable is... Lux (Sony Music Entertainment), is it also paradoxically, and in a more qualitative, artistic, profound sense, a failure?

]]> <![CDATA[New men, women of the same old]]> Perhaps one of the defining features of the 21st-century human experience is the discomfort many people feel (or we feel) in relation to our bodies and the anxieties that arise in the realm of identity. It is the "sufficiency of having a name, / the filth of having skin, / the filth of a womb struggling / with all the children they will not have," as Maria Sevilla says to Pulp teeth, and which rests on centuries of virtually unquestioned cisheteropatriarchal system, extremely rigid gender norms and a paradigm that has only just begun to change in decades.

]]> <![CDATA[Television insularity]]> It's easy to say, but it's no small feat: this year marks forty years that TV3 has been available to view from Mallorca. It all began in 1985, thanks to the Voltor Association, promoted by the Balearic Cultural Work (OBA), and the "We want TV in our language: TV3 now!" campaign, which received contributions from more than 1,000 citizens to purchase land in Alfàbia and install a repeater. Later, other networks arrived, such as Canal 33, the now-defunct Valencian Canal 9 and Punt 2, and the stations Catalunya Ràdio, Catalunya Informació, and Catalunya Música. And in 2005, naturally, IB3 was born, which has seen better and worse times in terms of language normalization and the representation of our society. But what remains of all this today? With all the apparent progress, do we have the audiovisual ecosystem we deserve?

]]> <![CDATA[Galicia, Euskal Herria, Catalan Countries]]> What was the last book you read originally written in Basque or Galician? How many authors would you name currently writing from Galicia or the Basque Country? And direct translators between these languages? If it's clear we have a few things in common, though not all of them good, why don't we have more spaces for exchange between the three cultural systems?

]]> <![CDATA[Who takes care of the classics?]]> We spoke a few days ago with the writer Sebastià Alzamora and the editor and poet Jordi Cornudella, at the presentation of the new edition of Béarn or the doll roomSurely, the maturity of a culture can also be measured by the care it takes for its heritage authors. Reading, rereading, and revisiting the ideas and creative universes of the writers who have come before us is a very good way to remind ourselves of where we come from and, above all, where we can gain momentum to move forward. This new edition of Béarn In Edicions 62, which recovers the definitive revision by Josep A. Grimalt and includes four readings by Alzamora, Carlota Gurt, Carme Riera, and myself, must be very similar to the way in which ordinary countries should relate to their artistic heritage: from a contemporary perspective, with historical and philological rigor. Yes! Béarn Return to the bookstores because, as Jaume Fuster said, every book we haven't read is something new.

]]> <![CDATA[The others, us, me]]> Surely, the book I have given as a gift the most times is Paradise is other people (Leonario Muntaner, Editor, 2016), by Valter Hugo Mãe. Not only because of the magnificent translation from Portuguese by Gabriel de la ST Sampol, nor because of the illustrations by Joan Miró that the publisher was wise enough to accompany it. No; if I've given this book away so often, it's because it presents a very specific vision of the importance of loving, of living in community, of a way of being in the world and cohabiting it. Like a beautiful and radical contradiction to Sartre's maxim that "hell is other people," Mãe speaks of love, of the very diverse types of couples and families that there can be, of animals, of sadness, and of loneliness, and she does so with the seemingly candid voice of a doll. She reminds us that life can be a little more worthwhile if we are part of a "we."

]]> <![CDATA[Against impotence]]> Twice the population of the Balearic Islands is trapped in a territory half the size of Menorca, condemned to hunger, systematic murder, and uncertainty while the international community looks on with a more or less grave expression. But what can we do now, from here? How can we help, even with a small gesture?

]]> <![CDATA[Disruption in Marivent]]> It doesn't happen to me all the time, but there are moments in our longing collective life that make me yearn for the malicious and often lucid pen of Llorenç Villalonga. The author of the Disruptions, of the myth of Bearn and the dystopia of touristified Mallorca refuted as Turclub in Andrea Víctrix He was also a broad-stroke caricaturist, loaded with bias and ideology, yes, but a caricaturist, nonetheless. He knew how to observe Mallorcan society with the cunning of the cats he liked so much (he had one, for example, that he called Moix), and then he portrayed it with the perfidy of a distorted mirror. Thus, the poet Aina Cohen was an alter ego of Maria Antònia Salvà, one of the best writers this island has ever produced, and a good part of the Mallorcan nobility of the time was scandalized to find themselves (or not to find themselves!) portrayed among the few dozen pages of Death of a LadyHis novels were often parades of characters who moved between the grotesque and the ambivalent, between sarcasm and the nevertheless.

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