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There are cities that are unique for a thousand reasons and that are unlike anywhere else. Like Ferrol, without going any further. Let me insist on it. And something very similar happens with certain writers: there are authors, like Torrente Ballester, to whom, fortunately, it is not easy to hang labels, and even less to pigeonhole them, because – to the greater joy of all his readers – their work always grows new branches. Last night, in one of those long conversations that little by little are returning to our lives after a time of loneliness like the one we had to live, some friends, who know the work of Torrente very well but who in reality did not know Ferrol – a city that I left them fascinated, and that they imagined as something very different-, they asked me, while we sipped coffee, my opinion on the fact of today, in a century in which everything seems to always be at hand, continue to exist, Paradoxically, so many and so many places that you never quite get to know. In addition to so much literature – so many works of art, in general – with which something very similar happens. And I told them the truth: I don’t know. I would have liked, of course, to be able to give you some ingenious answer, or at least sensible, but it is not the case. There are questions – in fact, every day – that I will never be able to understand. Although I would dare to say that Ferrol, beyond the place it occupies on the maps, is so great – because of its heritage, because of its history, because of what it symbolizes, because of what it has given to the world in areas such as those of the shipbuilding or the fight for freedom …- that to see it in its true dimension it is necessary to look for a good perspective, and of course to look at it from the right distance. As is the case with the work of Torrente Ballester, an author who, as Carlos Casares said, was very close to the Nobel Prize, and who nevertheless did not want to take the slightest step to obtain it; in fact, he did not even agree to go to Stockholm to give the lecture that a famous Swedish scholar of the time was trying to organize for him. Trying to fly high and look far – allow us the paragraph – is something very convenient. And Casares himself, who was a great friend of Torrente and who also felt a deep affection for Ferrol – he always said that the events of March 10, 72 had been a fundamental milestone in the fight against the dictatorship and on the road to freedom. democracy-, I used to comment that nothing happens because people do not like literature. But he knew better than anyone that books can make our lives better. As I knew better than anyone, too, that a city, if one truly wishes to enter it with the eyes of the heart, can be new every day. Despite the fact that we do not live in the best of times possible, I believe that Ferrol (Ferrol and everything that has to do with Ferrol) is going to gain a growing presence in the world. The presence it deserves for its journey through time, for the beauty of its landscape and architecture, for its contribution to science and for all that it has given to art. And with Torrente’s literature, you will see, the same will happen. Reread Daphne and reveries, please. There is the key. There it is, in fact, almost everything. By the way: as I write to you, at this very moment, it has started to rain again. Meekly and erasing the line of the mountain, as in Mazurca’s start for two dead, which is, for my particular taste, one of Cela’s best novels. There are few things more literary than erasing the horizon, don’t you think? But always with open eyes. Every man is a mystery, so no one should be judged, but seek the best of each, children Araxo Iglesias.
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