Portal de Turismo de Castilla y León

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November 7, 2025

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ELVIRA NAVARRO: Imagining the city ( Friday, 7)

In narrative, spaces are not mere places of transit or neutral backdrops, but are permeated by the intentions of the narrator. This is why, in a text, a city is never the same city. One could even say that the Paris of Flaubert or Cortázar, to give two famous examples, only existed in their books. However, this doesn't only happen in fiction. Chronicle writing also "invents" because no two perceptions or objectives are the same. Purpose selects; words modify, create. And furthermore, the city is an open book: through it we can understand our past and our present, and build our future. In this talk, we will discuss how contemporary cities shape us and how we shape them. We will address external and internal spaces, new ways of building and how to incorporate them into narrative, and, of course, the pressing issue of housing in a country full of saturated and gentrified urban centers, and empty or half-built houses in the suburbs and towns.
Elvira Navarro (1978) has published the books *La ciudad en invierno* (Caballo de Troya, 2007), * La ciudad feliz* (Mondadori, 2009), and *Los últimos días de Adelaida García Morales* (Random House, 2016). With *La trabajador* (Random House, 2014), a pioneering novel that narrates the disintegration of the contemporary individual as a consequence of the social and economic changes brought about by the crisis, she has become one of the leading voices in contemporary Spanish-language literature. Winner of the Jaén Novel Prize and the Andalucía Critics' Prize, in 2010 she was included in Granta magazine's list of the 22 best Spanish-language novelists under thirty-five. Her short story collection , *The Island of Rabbits * (Random House, 2019), was nominated for the National Book Award for Foreign Literature in 2021, and *The Voices of Adriana* (Random House, 2023) received the Cálamo Extraordinary Prize. *The Blood Is Falling into the Courtyard * (Random House, 2025) is her most recent book. Her work has been translated into English, French, Swedish, Italian, Japanese, Serbian, Korean, and Turkish.

JORGE DIONI LÓPEZ: A Room of One's Own on Airbnb ( Tuesday, 11)

A century ago, Virginia Woolf made it clear what basic elements are necessary for literary creation: a room of one's own and financial independence. This is something often obscured by romantic notions of inspiration, talent, or vocation, but material conditions, such as housing, allow some people to find their voice while silencing others. Artistic activity needs a stable place in which to develop, and that space must also be connected to others like it, because creation is always a collective process. When these conditions are lacking because the city is a product, culture is always affected. Voices disappear, or people turn their gaze to a past that seems more fertile and luminous.
Jorge Dioni López was born in Benavente (Zamora) in 1974. He holds a degree in journalism from the Autonomous University of Barcelona and his professional career spans newspapers ( Sport, Marca , and Metro ), radio (SER, RNE, and Ràdio Gràcia), and magazines ( GQ and El estado mental ). He teaches reading and writing workshops at the School of Writers and contributes to publications such as La Marea, El País, and Vanity Fair , where he writes about opera. His first book, La España de las piscinas (Arpa Editores, 2021), received the Book of the Year award from the Madrid Booksellers Guild. In 2023, he published El malestar de las ciudades (Arpa), and in 2025, Pornoocracia , also with Arpa. In between, in 2024, he published his first book of poems , La ciudad del otro (Lastura).