Catalan literature

In writing this brief history of Catalan literature, I have tried to bear in mind the needs of the non-specialist reader with some knowledge of Spanish who wishes to know more about an important but, on the whole, neglected area of Peninsular culture. Where English readers are concerned, the task, unfortunately, is long overdue: in a recent and otherwise excellent literary encyclopedia, the whole of Catalan literature is allotted the same amount of space as Jean-Paul Sartre, and this seems characteristic of a situation which few specialists as yet have tried to alter. The chief barrier, of course, is linguistic: yet it is not difficult to acquire at least a reading knowledge of Catalan, and for reasons which are given in Chapter 1, the older literature is relatively accessible to a modern reader compared, say, with that of France or Spain. This accessibility gives an impression of coherence to the entire range of Catalan literature which is reinforced to a great extent by social and historical tendencies. Roughly speaking, Catalan literature follows a recognizable European pattern, with one notable exception: the fact that its course is interrupted for something like three centurie