Homage to Barcelona

Description

A book celebrating one of Europe's greatest cities, moving from its founding to its huge growth in the 19th century and to the lives of Gaudi, Miro, Picasso, Casals and Dali.In this fascinating and comprehensive biography of a city, Toibin examines the story of Catalan, the horrors of the Civil War, Franco's rule and the eventual rise of democracy. Reflecting the city's own truly cosmopolitan nature, Toibin's writing covers Barcelona's art and architecture, its great churches and museums, its cafes, port life, restaurant's and fashionable nightclubs.Written with a deep knowledge of and affection for this astonishing city, it is a personal, carefully researched and finely crafted piece of work.

Colm Toibin was born in Ireland in 1955, and lives in Dublin. He is the author of four novels, including the 1999 Booker nominated The Blackwater Lightship. His non-fiction includes Bad Blood, Homage to Barcelona, The Sign of the Cross, and, most recently, Love in a Dark Time.

Toibin has the narrative poise of Brian Moore and the patient eye for domestic detail of John McGahern, but he is very much his own man. * Observer * Having lived in Barcelona off and on since the 70s, Toibin knows all the fascinations of its sensuous Mediterranean history and lifestyle and "the most precious jewels in the city's treasury of bars" . . . Toibin is the perfect guide. * Chicago Tribune *