Brittany, Esmeraldina

Amaury is a political prisoner, a member of the Resistance, who has just been admitted to Príncipe Prison in the land of Tagen Ata, a place 'that has been vilely regionalised by the republican regime of Terra Ancha'. Tagen Ata might be taken to refer to Galicia, and Terra Ancha to Spain. His homeland is Brittany. The novel takes the form of a letter he writes to his beloved Esmeraldina. During forty days of solitary confinement, he is visited by the Imam, the Doctor and a Chief Supervisory Officer, who orders the autonomous prison officers or apos to carry out a 'preventive' beating of the prisoner. He is nursed back to health by Corporal Hrutgy Simplicissimus, who couldn't care less whether Tagen Ata becomes an independent nation or not and has no faith in causes. After years of revolutionary devotion to the cause of the national liberation of Tagen Ata, 'which is the same as saying the cause of the liberation of all subjected peoples', Amaury cannot remember his roots, the place he is from, so he longs 'for all Brittany, despite realising that what I loved was a sigh in the evening, a chirruping of skylarks at midday, an enigmatic call of the earth, a scream, like that of a pig or of waves as they break among the mighty whirlpools of Morbihan and roar as if kelp had a gloomy voice'. All he remembers is the name of his family doctor, Dr Le Barre. Facing a life sentence, he decides to devote the fragment of time left of his life to searching for Dr Le Barre in the hope that he will lead him to his family, his name, his social status and his birthplace.Xosé Luís Méndez Ferrín, born in Ourense in 1938, is a towering figure in the Galician cultural and political landscape. He is part of a generation of writers who grew up in the shadow of the Spanish Civil War and himself spent time in prison for his political beliefs. He belongs to the New Galician Narrative movement, which was committed to using the Galician language and open to foreign influences. His books of fiction and poetry have exerted huge influence over later authors. Also available in English is his collection of stories Them and Other Stories. John Rutherford is Emeritus Fellow of The Queen's College, Oxford, where he founded and directed the Centre for Galician Studies that is now named after him. He is the translator of Don Quixote and La Regenta for Penguin Classics.