Jorge Gárriz is the founder and curator of the Festival of Queer Literature in Spanish in London, a festival he set up after realising there was no platform to talk to and about queer authors and literature from Latin America and Spain in London. Parallel to the festival Gárriz runs an online bookshop called Romancero Books which makes contemporary books in Spanish available to Spanish-speaking readers in the UK. We talked to him about the next edition of the festival taking place from the 22nd to the 26th of November in London.
Silvia Rothlisberger: The festival was initially called Festival of Queer Spanish Literature in London and you made a little tweak in the name to better represent the scope of the festival. Now called Festival of Queer Literature in Spanish in London, what are the reasons behind this change?
Jorge Gárriz: The festival is not about literature written only in Spanish or published only in Spain; the headline of our first edition was the Argentinian author Camila Sosa Villada and we have also invited Katya Adaui from Peru, Leo Boix from Argentina, the Chilean author and poets Ariel Richards, Sofia Vaisman and Natalia Figueroa.
The festival is not only promoting literature written in Spanish, for this year we have invited a poet who will be reciting poems in Basque and at our two previous editions we had Catalan writers speaking in Catalan. Having said this, we understand that using the word Spanish is polemic and complicated, because many people do not feel comfortable under this umbrella. Spain is the country that colonised all countries located in South America and writers from these countries don’t feel represented when using the word Spanish or Castilian for obvious reasons.
SR: This year’s edition has an amazing line-up of queer authors from Latin America and Spain plus a wide variety of themes that include diversity and music. Tell me about your criteria to curate this edition of the festival? From selecting the authors to the different themes you wanted to explore in the talks.
JG: Thank you for your kind words. The criteria changes every year based on the books that have been published during the last 12 months, or if there are any anniversaries to commemorate the death and life of a writer; or issues we find relevant to talk about.
2023 marks the 40th anniversary of [author José Pérez Ocaña] Ocaña’s death, the publication of the 39th zine of the legendary KINK magazine, and the launch of the English translation of Elizabeth Duval’s first novel Madrid will be their tomb.
With the queer poetry reading we always try to support young poets who have only published one or two books; and this year we have authors whose books have won many poetry awards in Spain and are at the forefront of contemporary poetry.
SR: The opening event is with author Elizabeth Duval about her novel Madrid Will BeTheir Tomb translated into English by Alice Banks. Tell us about this book and author?
JG: Elizabeth has published two novels, two essays and a few books of poems and she is not even 25 years old. Madrid Will Be Their Tomb, titled in Spanish as Madrid será nuestra tumba was written when she was 21 years old and the book is part of a broader collection of books titled National Episodes – that talk about contemporary Spanish historic episodes such us the Barcelona Olympic Games, the terrorist attacks in Madrid, among others.
Elizabeth is an extraordinary person and a prolific writer; and she’s a strong voice on LGBTQI+ rights, feminism, and equality. She is a well-known writer in Spain and Latin America and we want to be part of the arrival of her book into English.
SR: The closing in-person event is with award-winning poet Sara Torres about her memoir What It Is. A book that explores mourning, desire and love between women, mothers, and daughters. Can you expand on this author and the talk?
JG: Sara used to live in London and for us it was very special to invite her to join the festival. She is very well known as a poet and What it is / Lo que hay is her first book of narrative. We thought about including her in the poetry reading on Friday night, but we wanted to give Sara her own event to talk deeply not only about her latest book but also how this book dialogues with her previous published poetry books.
At previous edition we haven’t talk enough about lesbian literature and with Sara we feel we are also amending that.
SR: I’ve seen the festival evolve since its first edition in 2020 when for obvious reasons it was entirely online, the second and third edition are hybrids of in-person and online events. What have the challenges been of setting up the festival and moving it from online to in person?
JG: We know that all of us want to go to events, meet people and interact with other after three years of pandemic, this is why we have seven live events happening at this year’s festival. We are also keeping some online events – two podcast episodes because this allow other people who are not based in the UK to join some of the festival’s events.
The main challenge of live events is that the author needs to fly over, book a hotel, pay the expenses and the hiring of the space for the talk and obviously this increases the budget of the festival. Thanks to all the public funding we have received, we can cover these expenses and keep promoting queer literature.
SR: Translation is a big part of the festival, not only because some of the books have been translated into English and some of the guest speakers are the translators. But also because some events are in Spanish with English translation, others in Spanish and one event is simultaneously in Spanish and Basque. How do you balance all the language intersections?
JG: The main idea of the whole festival is to promote queer literature in London & the UK and make it accessible to both Spanish speakers and non-Spanish speakers. Talks about books that have been translated into English are in English but there are also talks about books that haven’t been translated into English yet, and the idea of organising these events is that those books find English-speaking editors interested in translating the books into English.
SR: We talked about the opening event and the closing event. What can you tell us about what’s happening in between during the Festival of Queer Literature in Spanish in London?
JG: The rest of the festival! We encourage everyone to have a look to the programme – there are events happening every evening; from the lecture about Torremolinos in the 1960’s and 1970’s from an architectural, sexual and desire point of view, to the talk about Ocaña at the Auditorium at Foyles or the launch of KINK39, the legendary gay zine created by Paco y Manolo or the party happening after this event with Jimmy Acid and 2CPERREA.
We are also very proud about the queer poetry reading we have put together this year; we invited seven poets to join the reading evening at The Common Press.
SR: Before you started Festival of Queer Literature in Spanish in London came your online bookshop Romancero Books. What is the bookshop about and why did you decided to set it up?
JG: Romancero Books is an online bookshop where you can find books published in Spain and Latin America as well as their translations into English. I’ve been living in London for 13 years and it was really complicated to read contemporary literature in Spanish. Every time I went home I’d buy books that I couldn’t buy here and after talking about this with friends, we realised that we were all in the same situation. Living abroad also made me feel detached from my own culture and what was happening with literature in Spain. These are the two main reasons why I decided to open Romancero.
Jorge Gárriz is the founder of Romancero Books and the Festival of Queer Literature in Spanish in London. Romancero Books CIC is an online bookshop of Spanish and Latin American literature based in London. Their catalogue covers themes such as Lorca, female writers from Generación del 27, writers in exile and diaspora and new LGBTQI+ voices as well a large programme of cultural events called Romancero Talks. Twitter: @romancerobooks // @jorgegarriz
Silvia Rothlisberger is a journalist and writer based in London. She is contributing editor at Minor Literature[s], with a focus on literature in translation and Latin American culture. Twitter: @silviarothlis
minor literature[s] 