Books to understand the world

New publications for Sant Jordi 

This 2024, the collection Ciutats per pensar Europa has been presented. It reflects on the role of cities forming the idea of Europe in comparative literature. The collection has two titles: Capitals culturals: entre pedres i literatura, by Antoni Martí Monterde, and Trieste. Una ciutat a plec de mapa, by Joan Benesiu. The idea of Europe is not only written from the great centres of economic and political powers but it is also found in cultural geography. From this alternative cartography, cities such as Trieste have contributed to European literature.  

Coinciding with the three hundred birth anniversary of Immanuel Kant, the collection Filosofia UB publishes the first Catalan translation (by Miquel Montserrat Capella) of Critique of Pure Reason, one of the fundamental works of the history of philosophy. The edition of this publishing milestone, the fruit of years of dedication and intellectual commitment, which, beyond putting an end to a serious lack in our culture, brings us closer to a fundamental thinker of modernity. As we read in the prologue by Salvi Turró: “For us, it is still as relevant, if not more so, than in the Enlightenment to understand the role and limits of knowledge and its technological drift, the relationship between the theoretical moment and the demands of ethical, social and political praxis”. On the other hand, Filòsofes de la contemporaneïtat, the genealogy written by Núria Sara Miras Boronat on six of today’s most outstanding female thinkers, is celebrating its third edition. 

El món d’avui. De la guerra freda als reptes de la interdependència global, by Antoni Segura, emeritus profesor of Contemporary History at the University of Barcelona and president of  CIDOB - Barcelona Centre for International Affairs, es el último título de la colección CEHI-UB. This is an essential reference book for contemporary world studies: it begins in 1945 and continues up to the present day, following and analysing the episodes in history that have led to the current international scenario, which is more globalised and complex than ever before. 

In the field of communication, the Periodisme Actiu collection reaches its twenty-first title with the publication of Periodismo y democracia en la era de las emociones, by Josep Carles Rius, which deals with the task of approaching the truth of information, an activity that in the last decade has been made difficult by several events that have generated great emotional waves. The book vindicates responsible, honest journalism committed to human rights with the ultimate aim of safeguarding freedom and justice. 

Regarding education, as part of the Pedagogies UB collection, Núria Obiols has edited the collective work Contes i cancel·lació cultural. Controvèrsies i perspectives sobre els continguts dels contes, in which she asks whether it is a good decision to avoid contact between the new generations and certain contents of a past that have become questionable in the present day. She also asks where the boundary between what is appropriate and what is not in the field of children's fiction lies, and who should determine this boundary and under what parameters. Another novelty in the collection is Fer-se a la mar. Narratives d’una descoberta pedagògica, by Oriol Brugarolas, Èric Ortega and Àngel Pascual (eds.), which explores the educational interest in the sea from a historical perspective. 

The Filologia UB - Biblioteca Càmar collection has published a particularly important title: Cartas (1949-1955). La filología románica en la posguerra, edited and studied by Isabel de Riquer, presents the correspondence between two great Romanist philologists, Martín de Riquer and István Frank. At the end of the Second World War, the work of the medievalists who, despite difficult personal circumstances, had not stopped their research, came to light. The more than one hundred and fifty letters that Riquer and Frank sent to each other — as well as the evolution of the tone of their writings and the relationship between the two scholars — are a good testimony to this. 

For the botany lovers, Manual práctico de botànica. Morfología de las plantas vasculares, by Jaume Llistosella and Mercè Bernal, the translation into Spanish of a guide full of beautiful images that has already had its second edition published in Catalan. The book includes a descriptive part of nearly four hundred species of vascular plants — or chromophytes — and a glossary of botanical terms to bring the reader closer to the vocabulary of this science, as well as a specific bibliography. This title joins the works on the same subject by Jaume Llistosella and Antoni Sànchez-Cuxart: El herbario: matas, hierbas y helechos (2019); Guía ilustrada para conocer los arbustos y las lianas (2020), and Guía ilustrada para conocer los árboles (2021). All three titles are also published in Spanish.