Books

British Barcelona

A book unveils the close relationship between the Catalan capital and the British Isles

With de­bate rag­ing about the model of tourism for the Cata­lan cap­i­tal, the Cos­setània pub­lish­ers have just re­leased La Barcelona britànica i ir­lan­desa (British and Irish Barcelona). The book of­fers an al­ter­na­tive view of the city, trac­ing the marks left by the Anglo-Saxon and Celtic cul­tures since the Mid­dle Ages.

Writ­ten by Joan M. Serra, with a fore­ward by Matthew Tree, La Barcelona britànica i ir­lan­desa un­cov­ers the “close re­la­tion­ship be­tween the city and the British Isles through­out his­tory,” says the au­thor. For in­stance, the book re­views the strong re­la­tion­ship be­tween Ramon Berenguer IV and the King Henry II of Eng­land. An­other char­ac­ter fea­tur­ing in the book is Mit­ford Crowe, an Eng­lish­man who was a me­di­a­tor be­tween the Cata­lan dukes and the Queen of Eng­land dur­ing the War of Span­ish Suc­ces­sion in the 18th cen­tury, a con­flict that ended in the Gen­ova agree­ment and a firm al­liance be­tween Cat­alo­nia and the British, ac­cord­ing to Serra.

An­other tie is the exile of physi­cian Josep Trueta, who fled the Civil War to be re­ceived “with all ho­n­ours” in Eng­land;. Then there are the broth­ers Arthur and Ernest Witty, key fig­ures in the de­vel­op­ment of foot­ball and ten­nis in Cat­alo­nia. Arthur was the num­ber two mem­ber of Barcelona FC and pres­i­dent of the club be­tween 1903-1905. His brother Ernest was one of the founders of the Barcelona Lawn Ten­nis Club, one of the first clubs of its kind in the coun­try.

The book also pro­vides an overview of the city’s Anglo-Saxon ar­chi­tec­tural her­itage, such as the Fabra i Coats fac­tory, built in the early 20th cen­tury after the Man­ches­ter style, “much higher then the Cata­lan style,” says Serra. An­other ex­am­ple is the Collserola tower (cel­e­brat­ing 25 years this year), de­signed by the fa­mous British ar­chi­tect Nor­man Fos­ter.

The pe­riod with the most con­tact be­tween the two coun­tries goes from the 18th cen­tury to pre­sent: “In the 18th cen­tury, the spir­its and tex­tile trades de­vel­oped, and in the 19th cen­tury Cata­lan in­dus­try fol­lowed the model of the in­dus­tri­al­i­sa­tion process in the UK; in the 20th cen­tury com­mer­cial re­la­tion­ships be­came more im­por­tant and nowa­days, many British com­pa­nies have of­fices in Barcelona and the most nu­mer­ous tourists in Barcelona are British.

La Barcelona britànica i ir­lan­desa is part of the Barcelona Cos­mopo­lis pro­ject, a col­lec­tion of guide books which link the Cata­lan cap­i­tal to the French, Jew­ish, Ital­ian and British cul­tures. Next up is La Barcelona africana.

La Barcelona britànica i irlandesa Author: Joan M. Serra Publisher: Cossetània Pages: 168
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