Joan Gili Memorial Lecture: Twenty Years Without Joan Fuster and Vicent Andrés Estellés by JAUME PÉREZ MONTANER

pp. 63–89

Abstract

It is with great pleasure that the Journal of Catalan Studies relaunches the publication of the edited Joan Gili Memorial Lecture Series. In its 1999 issue, and in memory of his death in Oxford on 6 May 1998, the Journal published a full biography of Joan Gili, detailing his life as an antiquarian book-seller, publisher, translator and defender of Catalan letters.1 Given Gili’s contribution to the Society, as founder member in 1954 and later President, it was unanimously agreed that the keynote at its Annual Conference would henceforce be given in his name. With an illustrious list of speakers since its inception in 1999, the range of topics comprising the Joan Gili Memorial Lecture Series are a testimony to the enduring strength and dynamism of the field.2 Moreover, in the true spirit of the Society —and of Gili himself— to disseminate and promote Catalan culture, it was agreed that these lectures should be edited and/or translated to be made available for future consultation. This task, which was originally undertaken by the Anglo-Catalan Society’ s Occasional Publications (ACSOP) in the form of printed pamphlets until 2011, will now be resumed in digital format as part of a dedicated section in the Journal’s standard issues. The first lecture for publication as part of this revived series is that delivered by Jaume Pérez Montaner at the 58th Annual Anglo-Catalan Society Conference held at the University of Sheffield in November 2012. Originally presented in Catalan as “Fuster i Estellés: 20 anys després”, following with ACSOP tradition, the text has been translated into English (by Dominic Keown) and edited for publication by the Journal.