French/English Interpreter: Brian Valente-Quinn. Wolof/French Translator: Babacar Thiaw Versión en español aquí Version française ici Tekki bi ci làkkub Wolof Omar Pene, co-founder and lead singer of the Dakar-based supergroup Super Dianomo, has been composing and playing for 50 years, releasing albums both with Dianomo and as a solo artist. […]
English
Philippe Sands: “Don’t impose your emotions or your conclusions on the reader”
(Versión en español aquí) Philippe Sands (London, 1960) is a writer, university professor and international lawyer. He has been involved in cases concerning the war in Yugoslavia, the Rwandan genocide, the abuses in Iraq and Guantanamo, the indictment of Pinochet, the killing of Lebanese Prime Minister Rafic Hariri, the persecution […]
Richard Morgan: «My worry about tech is that it seems to be in the hands of a small group of weird people who are often very much disconnected from what I would think of as normal human experience»
(Versión en español aquí) People say that succeeding with the publication of a first work can become the worst burden for a writer. Whether this is true or the justification of the most envious, Richard Morgan (London, 1965) does not seem to have fallen into this trap. After the appearance […]
Faraday’s dogma
(Versión en castellano aquí) When asked the secret of doing science, the great chemist Michael Faraday, replied in the early 1800s: Work, finish, publish- no-nonsense common sense from a humble autodidact, who rose from working class ob- scurity to being offered (and refusing) the Presidency of the Royal Society in […]
Blixa Bargeld: “Art is not dead, because freedom is not dead”
Photography: Óscar Fernández Orengo (Versión en castellano aquí) As you will see in the turbulent start of the interview, Blixa Bargeld (Berlín Occidental, 1959) has come to the Kosmopolis CCCB festival in Barcelona to talk about his book and offer one of his solo vocal performances, and he doesn’t seem very […]
Day two: Trapped in hell
(Versión en español aquí) They are always there. On the road that goes from the monolith with a seahorse – the symbol of this city – to a mosque that the war left in ruins before it was even built. It is enough to greet any one of those who […]
Day one: We have managed to enter Libya
(Versión en español aquí) In Zuwarah the streets have no name. This is not a cliché, but a fact. It’s not that important, because nobody sends letters anymore, not there or here, and in Zuwarah they don’t receive bills. Somebody told me that, in 2012, a group of inspectors was created whose mission […]
The Man from Earth: A second meeting with the 14.000-year-old man
(Versión en castellano aquí) For fans of the genre, the film «The Man from Earth», released in 2007 is already one of the essential titles in the catalog of modern science fiction. Included in the circuits of independent cinema, and with a modest ticket office, it never reached the general […]
Fabiola Gianotti: «Progress evolves smoothly based on the development and improvement of known technology»
Translation: Teresa Galarza (Versión en castellano aquí) If we had to describe Fabiola Gianotti in a single word that would be vocation. If we had two, we could add: magnetism. If we were granted a third, it would be, undoubtedly: flair. The first woman to hold the position of coordinator of […]
Afghanistan still exists
(Versión en castellano aquí) In memory of Lorena Enebral Pérez «The really important kind of freedom involves attention, and awareness, and discipline, and effort, and being able truly to care about other people and to sacrifice for them, over and over, in myriad petty little unsexy ways every day.» David […]
Day eigth: Inscrutable and, sometimes, wonderful roads
Translation: Teresa Galarza (Versión en español aquí) Shortcuts. On the shoulders of a country at war We were at the front of Raqqa, the capital of the Islamic State in Syria, when the terrible events of Barcelona took place. We found out when one of the fighters with whom we […]
Day seven: Starry Night
Translation: Teresa Galarza (Versión en español aquí) Shortcuts. On the shoulders of a country at war Like in the rearguard, in the front of Raqqa it is usual to sleep on the roofs of houses. You should take some basic precautions such as not smoking, lighting a flashlight or using […]