Usually our last day wherever is pretty quiet, spent packing, cleaning, checking arrangements, getting ready for the next adventure. Not so Barcelona: it was city patron saint St. George's Day, celebrating romance, and also, traditionally, World Book Day, celebrating books. St. George really doesn't get much attention, and it's not really a holiday, but the city's various centers--Las Ramblas, St. Jaume's, the Passeig Gracia, etc.--all are crammed with book stalls and other stalls selling roses. The tradition is that boys give girls a rose, and girls give boys a book. Of course, nowadays, anything goes,* but mostly you see books and roses. Everywhere. The Passeig Gracia was nearly a mile of books and roses, and thousands upon thousands of people, all the way from Placa Catalunya to Avenuda Diagonal, Las Ramblas de la Catalunyas and all the side streets similarly crammed. Wheeled conveyances were mostly banned from the city center, and for much of the way, it was elbow-to-elbow, especially on Gracia, a very wide boulevard indeed. Some of our best memories of such events--the Feria in Seville, the Basque Week and its fireworks competition extravaganza in San Sebastian--have occurred in Spain, and St. George's Day in Barcelona will now join that list.
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Roses for sale near our apartment at Arc de Triomf; Catalan
colors, identity, and, yes, separatism, are still going strong... |
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The book tents, mostly publishers but some bookstores, go on for
block and blocks and blocks |
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| Author signings |
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| Side street |
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| Other side of two long columns of stalls |
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Hundreds of thousands of print books; makes you feel almost
guilty owning a Kindle or reading on your phone |
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| Readings and interviews |
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| Approaching the Block of Discord |
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| Another side street |
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Our only disappointment...we'd (foolishly) hoped to have lunch at
Cervesaria Catalana, but found it closed; we tried Casa Flauta, as
recommended, but the wait there was two hours and thirty minutes;
we settled for a pretty good Naples-style pizza on another side street |
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| And the party goes on |
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| Casa Mila, all decked out |
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| But the biggest star was Casa Battlo |
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| As dense a crowd as I've seen |
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We took refuge in Casa Amattler; the hot chocolate
fountain there |
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The Casa Battlo gift shop...where we exited; Vicki
adds that it is one of Barcelona's three great artsy
gift shoppes |
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And walked home admiring ever more great Modernista architecture |
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| House of Points |
*"...good authors too, who once knew better words, now only use four-letter words, writing prose, anything goes..."
