RAMON LLULL (1232-1316)
Ramon Llull is to Catalan literature what Shakespeare is to English, Dante to Italian, and Goethe to German literature. Llull placed his prose at the service of a great ideal - the peaceful conversion of people to Christianity through highly elaborate, distinct, beautiful, and irrefutable philosophical ideas. His genius is so great -he could write equally well in Latin, Catalan or Arabic- that even today his huge opus (of more than extant 265 titles) attracts the attention of countless literary specialists, philosophers, and theologians around the world.
Ramon Llull, Palma, Mallorca (Balearic Islands), 1232-1316 was a philosopher, theologian, novelist and poet. He was born into a family possibly of noble Catalan stock. His father arrived in Mallorca with the troops of Catalan king James the Conqueror. Llull was born in the island during the period immediately after the conquest, and during his youth he was attached to the royal house. We know relatively little about his years as a courtier - he got married, had two children, and led the life that befitted his station. But at the age of thirty-one he was shaken by an experience that prompted a radical turn to his life - his so-called "conversion" that took place after five apparitions of Christ on the cross.
According to the testimony he offers in his Vida coetània (Contemporary Life), an autobiography dictated by Llull to some Carthusian monks in Paris not long before he died, after this experience a new life started for the convert, who would renounce his family, his social position, and all riches, in order to devote himself fully to the service of God. He did not enter any religious order, but rather conceived of the dedication of his life to God in terms of frenetic activity that can be summarised in three objectives: to preach to the infidels to the point of risking martyrdom; to write a book to refute the errors of these infidels (stating it would have to be "the best book in the world"); and to set up monastery schools where Arabic, together with other oriental languages, would be taught for the instruction of missionaries. In a word, Llull's overwhelming obsession right up to the final moments of his life would be the conversion of Muslims, Jews and other infidels (especially the Tartars) to the Christian faith. (full text)
Ramon Llull, Palma, Mallorca (Balearic Islands), 1232-1316 was a philosopher, theologian, novelist and poet. He was born into a family possibly of noble Catalan stock. His father arrived in Mallorca with the troops of Catalan king James the Conqueror. Llull was born in the island during the period immediately after the conquest, and during his youth he was attached to the royal house. We know relatively little about his years as a courtier - he got married, had two children, and led the life that befitted his station. But at the age of thirty-one he was shaken by an experience that prompted a radical turn to his life - his so-called "conversion" that took place after five apparitions of Christ on the cross.
According to the testimony he offers in his Vida coetània (Contemporary Life), an autobiography dictated by Llull to some Carthusian monks in Paris not long before he died, after this experience a new life started for the convert, who would renounce his family, his social position, and all riches, in order to devote himself fully to the service of God. He did not enter any religious order, but rather conceived of the dedication of his life to God in terms of frenetic activity that can be summarised in three objectives: to preach to the infidels to the point of risking martyrdom; to write a book to refute the errors of these infidels (stating it would have to be "the best book in the world"); and to set up monastery schools where Arabic, together with other oriental languages, would be taught for the instruction of missionaries. In a word, Llull's overwhelming obsession right up to the final moments of his life would be the conversion of Muslims, Jews and other infidels (especially the Tartars) to the Christian faith. (full text)
ALFONS DE BORJA
(POPE CALLIXTUS III) (1378-1458)
Pope Callixtus III (Catalan: Calixt III), né Alfons de Borja, was Pope from 8 April 1455 to his death in 1458. Alfonso de Borja was born in La Torreta, now a neighbourhood of Canals, Valencia -- today in Spain -- but at that time in the Kingdom of Valencia under the Crown of Aragon. During the western schism he supported Antipope Benedict XIII, and was the driving force behindAntipope Clement VIII's submission to Pope Martin V in 1429. His early career was spent as a professor of law at the University of Lleidaand then as a diplomat in the service of the Kings of Aragon, especially during the Council of Basel (1431–1439). He became a cardinal after reconciling Pope Eugene IV with King Alfonso V of Aragon. (full text)
RODERIC LLANÇOL I DE BORJA
(POPE ALEXANDER VI) (1431-1502)
Pope Alexander VI, born Roderic Llançol i de Borja was pope from 1492 until his death on 18 August 1503. He is one of the most controversial of the Renaissance popes, and his Italianized surname Borgia became a byword for the debased standards of the Papacy of that era, most notoriously the Banquet of Chestnuts in 1501.
Roderic Llançol was born on 1 January 1431 in the town of Xàtiva in the Kingdom of Valencia, one of the component realms of the Crown of Aragon. His parents were the Valencian Jofré Llançol i Escrivá (died bef. 24 March 1437) and his wife and relative the Aragonese Isabel de Borja (died 19 October 1468). His family name is written Llançol in Valencian. Rodrigo adopted his mother's family name of Borja in 1455 following the elevation to the papacy of his maternal uncle Alfons de Borja (Italianized to Alfonso Borgia) as Calixtus III. (full text)
ANTONI GAUDÍ i CORNET (1852-1926)
Born in Reus, Catalonia, the son of a coppersmith, and spent almost all his career in Barcelona. He was a patriotic Catalan and is said to have insisted on using the Catalan language even when talking to the King of Spain. The other major forces that shaped his life were a devotion to his work and a devout Christian faith.
In 1878 he graduated from the Escuela Superior de Arquitectura, Barcelona, and soon afterwards met Eusebi Güell (1847–1918), a wealthy industrialist and Catalan nationalist who became his main patron, commissioning the Parc Güell and other works.
Gaudí’s work was influenced by various sources, including Gothic and Islamic architecture, and it has features in common with the Art Nouveau style fashionable at the time. However, his buildings have a sense of bizarre fantasy that sets them apart from anything else in the history of architecture. Walls undulate as if they were alive, towers grow like giant anthills, columns slant out of the vertical, and surfaces are encrusted with unconventional decoration, including broken bottles.
Gaudí died after being hit by a trolley bus. He cared so little for material success that – in spite of his great reputation – he was mistaken for a tramp and taken to a paupers’ ward in hospital.
Antoni Gaudí’s amazing buildings in Barcelona established him as the most original European architect in the early years of the 20th century. (+ info)
Antoni Gaudí’s amazing buildings in Barcelona established him as the most original European architect in the early years of the 20th century. (+ info)
JOSEP JOFRE (1852-1931)
PAU CASALS (1876-1973)
JOAN MIRÓ (1893-1983)
SALVADOR DALÍ (1904-1989)
JOAN PUJOL i GARCIA (1912-1988)
Born in Barcelona on February 14th 1912 to a well-to-do Catalan family, Joan Pujol García enjoyed a reputation as a playboy in his early years and took a dim view, like many of his class, of the revolutionary events of 1936, doing his best to avoid being called up. After a spell in prison, he was finally enlisted in 1938 and took part without, he claimed, actually firing a bullet in the Battle of the Ebro, the largest battle of the Civil War. At the end of the campaign, with the Republic’s troops in disarray, he deserted and crossed the lines over to Franco’s side. Then, if Pujol had kept to the script of others like him, he would have vanished from history, returning as a victor to enjoy the rapacious fruits of the corruption and theft that fell on the city after its fall to Franco.
Instead, at the end of the war, Pujol travelled to Madrid. He had developed a deep-seated loathing of totalitarianism after seeing the rise of Stalinism in Barcelona in 1937, and after listening to the BBC’s broadcasts he became a fervent anti-Nazi. Then, at some point in 1940, with the Second World War underway, he resolved to help the Allies’ cause and presented himself at the British embassy in order to volunteer his services as a spy. The British were either disinterested or didn’t trust him. Undeterred he offered his services to the Third Reich with the brazen intent of becoming a double-agent for London. The Germans were won over by his ardent Nazi stance, (for Pujol was becoming a consummate actor), accepted him and gave him the codename Arabel. (full text)
RAMON MERCADER (1914-1978)
On August 20th, 1940, a 27-year-old Catalan drove an ice axe into the head of Leon Trotsky at his Mexican home. The blow failed to kill him, and Trotsky struggled with his assassin. His guards, hearing the commotion, burst in and set upon the assailant, but Trotsky stopped them, exclaiming, “Do not kill him! This man has a story to tell.” Trotsky died the next day, and the murderer was turned over to the police. He identified himself as Jacques Mornard, a disillusioned Belgian Trotskyist. He said he had killed the old Bolshevik after quarrelling over a woman and was sentenced to 20 years in prison.
Though few knew Mornard’s true identity, the fact that the assassination had been ordered by Stalin was an open secret. Furthermore a number of Catalan republicans in Mexico knew something more. They recognised the killer’s photo in the press, but did not want to reveal his true identity for fear of provoking a reaction against the many Spanish refugees in the country. Finally in 1952, Mercader slipped up. A prison guard heard the “Belgian” singing a nursery rhyme Què li darem, en el Noi de la Mare? Què li darem que li’n sàpiga bo?1 in perfect Catalan from his cell. This clue led the authorities to his real identity: his name was Ramón Mercader, and he was indeed an NKVD agent.(full text)
FRANCESC BOIX i CAMPO (1920-1951)
In the entrance to the Francesc Boix public library on Carrer Blai in Poble Sec there is a black and white photograph of a young man dressed in a greatcoat. A Leica camerahangs round his neck. Behind him are the barbed wires and barracks of a Nazi work camp. Just around the corner from the library, at Margarit 19, a plaque informs us that Francesc Boix i Campo was born here on August 14th 1920, and that he was “a photographer, fighter against fascism, prisoner at Mauthausen, and the only Spaniard to be called as a witness at the Nuremburg Trials against the leaders of the Third Reich”.
Little is known of Boix’s early life. His father was a tailor and ran a shop (today an excellent bar) under the family home, where in the evenings he would host meetings with left-wing Catalanists. He was also an amateur photographer and instilled in his son a love of the camera. (full text)
Link: Nuremberg Trial Proceedings Volume 6: Fortieth Day (01-22-46) to the Fiftieth Day (02-04-46) (1, 2)
