‘I looked out of the corner of my eye at Inspector Cuenca, and said to myself that in spite of his air of a sad tortoise and disillusioned old man he was a fortunate man. I thought it but I didn’t tell him. The question I’d asked him remained unanswered and we sat there in silence for a while, enduring the sun on our faces, watching through half-closed eyes the urban hustle and bustle of Sant Agustí in front of General Álvarez de Castro. Until at some point I stood up and said: Well, now can I buy you a coffee? Inspector Cuenca opened his eyes wide, as if my question had woken him up; then he sighed again, stood up as well and, as we started across the plaza towards the Royal, said: If it’s all the same to you, let’s have a beer.’
Author’s Note
This novel would not have been possible without the collaboration of Francisco Pamplona and, especially, Carles Monguilod, whose book Vint-i-cinc anys i un dia was one of the initial spurs to this story. Aside from them, Carmen Balcells and David Trueba read a draft and provided extremely useful observations. I’ve borrowed from Antony Beevor an expression I heard him use over dinner in London, one evening in the winter of 2011. What the books I’ve written over the last twenty-five years and I owe to Jordi Gracia would never fit in an acknowledgments note. I am also in debt to the following books: Hasta la libertad, by Juan José Moreno Cuenca; Historia del Julián, by Juan F. Gamella; Els castellans, by Jordi Puntí; Quinquis dels 80: Cinema, prensa i carrer, by various authors; and Memòries del barri xino, an unpublished manuscript by Gerard Bagué. I’d also like to thank Joan Boada, Josep Anton Bofill, Antoni Candela, Emili Caula, Jordi Caula and Narcís Caula, Jordi Corominas, Mery Cuesta, Daniel de Antonio, Tomás Frauca (not Franca), Pepe Guerrero, Ramón Llorente, Llorenç Martí, Puri Mena, Mariana Montoya, Isabel Salamanya, Carlos Sobrino, Robert Soteras, Guillem Terribas and Fernando Velasco.
Translator’s Note
I would like to thank Nika Blazer, Jim Smith and Ben Ward for their helpful suggestions and discussions.
A Note on the Author
Javier Cercas was born in 1962. He is a novelist, short-story writer and columnist, whose books include Soldiers of Salamis (which sold more than a million copies worldwide, won six literary awards in Spain and was filmed by David Trueba), The Tenant and The Motive, The Speed of Light and The Anatomy of a Moment, which won Spain’s National Narrative Prize. He taught at the University of Illinois in the late 1980s and for many years was a lecturer in Spanish literature at the University of Gerona. His books have been translated into more than thirty languages. In 2011 he was awarded the International Prize of the Turin Book Fair for his oeuvre. He lives in Barcelona.
A Note on the Translator
Anne McLean has translated Latin-American and Spanish novels, short stories, memoirs and other writings by authors including Héctor Abad, Carmen Martín Gaite, Julio Cortázar, Ignacio Martínez de Pisón, Enrique Vila-Matas, Tomás Eloy Martínez and Juan Gabriel Vásquez. She has twice won the Independent Foreign Fiction Prize: for Soldiers of Salamis by Javier Cercas in 2004 (which also won her the Valle Inclán Award), and for The Armies by Evelio Rosero in 2009. She was awarded the Spanish Cross of the Order of Civil Merit as recognition of her contribution to making Spanish literature known to a wider public. She lives in Toronto.