Nada, which means "nothing" in Spanish, is the first novel of Spanish author Carmen Laforet, published in 1945.
Nada, which means "nothing" in Spanish, is the first novel of Spanish author Carmen Laforet, published in 1945.
The novel is set in the post-Spanish Civil War Barcelona. The novel is narrated by its main character, Andrea, an orphan, who has fond memories of her well off family in Barcelona, and has been raised in a convent in provincial Spain.
The government has awarded Andrea a scholarship and a subsistence stipend so that she can attend university. She travels to Barcelona to the home of her grandmother, only to find it filthy and falling apart. Her frail, devoutly Catholic grandmother seems unaware of her miserable surroundings. Also living in the crumbling house is a strict, controlling aunt Angustias, a roguish, but musically talented uncle, Román, another uncle, Juan, who abuses his beautiful wife Gloria. The whole group regularly comes to blows throughout Andrea’s stay, and Angustias eventually escapes by entering a convent.
At the university, Andrea befriends a rich girl, Ena, who begins a strange relationship with Andrea's uncle Román. She pretends to care for him, but is really taking revenge for his poor treatment of her mother years before.
When Román gets involved in the black market, Gloria reports him to the authorities. He commits suicide, for fear of arrest by the Francoist police.
Ena and her family move to Madrid, and soon send for Andrea to join them. [1] Ena’s father offers to give Andrea a job and subsidize her further education. In the final part of the novel, Andrea is picked up by the family’s fancy car, leaving behind her unpleasant life on Aribau Street in Barcelona. [2]
Nada was published in 1945, when LaForet was 23, and created a "sensation" in Barcelona when it came out. [3] [4] Nada won Laforet the first Premio Nadal literary prize in Spain. [5] [6]
This book passed the censorship of the Francoist State and so it avoids directly addressing the harshness of the government at the time. However, the book became very popular when it finally cleared Franco’s censors. [7] It is considered to be an important contribution to the school of Existentialist literature of post-Civil War Spain. [8] [9]
In 2007 an English translation of Nada by Edith Grossman was published. [10] In Bookmarks May/June 2007 issue, a magazine that aggregates critic reviews of books, the book received a 
(4.5 out of 5) with the summary stating, "The Los Angeles Times sums up general sentiment: "Nada a coming-of-age novel, but it’s also a work of genius, small but indelible". [11] Globally, the work was received generally well with Complete Review saying on the consensus "Almost all very impressed -- with a lot of harping on how young she was when she wrote it". [12]
Fernández-Lamarque and Fernández-Babineaux see metatextual references with Little Red Riding Hood and gender inversion in the novel depicting Andrea and Ena as androgynous beings. [13]
Juan Goytisolo Gay was a Spanish poet, essayist, and novelist. He lived in Marrakesh from 1997 until his death in 2017. He was considered Spain's greatest living writer at the beginning of the 21st century, yet he had lived abroad since the 1950s. On 24 November 2014 he was awarded the Cervantes Prize, the most prestigious literary award in the Spanish-speaking world.
Carmen Laforet was a Spanish author who wrote in the period after the Spanish Civil War. An important European writer, her works contributed to the school of Existentialist Literature and her first novel Nada continued the Spanish tremendismo literary style begun by Camilo José Cela with his novel, La familia de Pascual Duarte. She received the Premio Nadal in 1944.
Alberto Manguel is an Argentine-Canadian anthologist, translator, essayist, novelist, editor, and a former director of the National Library of Argentina. He is a cosmopolitan and polyglot scholar, speaking English, Spanish, German, and French fluently, and also Italian and Portuguese at a very advanced level. He left Argentina at the age of twenty, in 1968. He has lived in Israel, Argentina, France, United Kingdom, Italy, French Polynesia, Canada, United States and Portugal. Since 2021 he has directed an international center for reading studies in Lisbon, baptized in 2023 as Espaço Atlântida; In the biography of the center's website you can read: "He became a Canadian citizen and continues to identify his nationality as first and foremost Canadian."
Edith Marion Grossman was an American literary translator. Known for her work translating Latin American and Spanish literature to English, she translated the works of Nobel laureate Mario Vargas Llosa, Nobel laureate Gabriel García Márquez, Mayra Montero, Augusto Monterroso, Jaime Manrique, Julián Ríos, Álvaro Mutis, and Miguel de Cervantes. She was a recipient of the PEN/Ralph Manheim Medal for Translation and the 2022 Thornton Wilder Prize for Translation.
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Antonio Muñoz Molina is a Spanish writer and, since 8 June 1995, a full member of the Royal Spanish Academy. He received the 1991 Premio Planeta, the 2013 Jerusalem Prize, and the 2013 Prince of Asturias Award for literature.
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Carme Riera Guilera is a novelist and essayist. She has also written short stories, scripts for radio and television and literary criticism. She holds a doctorate in Hispanic Philology and is a professor of Spanish literature at the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona.
Locos de amor is a 2016 Peruvian musical romantic comedy film directed by Frank Pérez-Garland and written by Bruno Ascenzo and Mariana Silva. It stars Lorena Caravedo, Giovanni Ciccia, Carlos Carlín, Jimena Lindo, Gonzalo Torres, Rossana Fernández Maldonado, Nicolás Galindo and Gianella Neyra. It was released on May 5, 2016, in Peruvian theaters.
Nada is a 1947 Spanish drama film directed by Edgar Neville. It is based on Carmen Laforet's famous novel Nada which won the Premio Nadal. It was written by Carmen Laforet.
Fernanda Eberstadt is an American writer living in France.
Ana María Moix was a Spanish poet, novelist, short story writer, translator and editor. A member of the Novísimos, she was the younger sister of the writer, Terenci Moix.
The Long Song is a historical novel by Andrea Levy published in 2010 that was the recipient of the Walter Scott Prize. It was Levy's fifth and final novel, following the 2004 publication of Small Island. In December 2018, a three-part television adaptation of the same name was broadcast on BBC One; The Long Song was aired on PBS in February 2021.
Faustina Sáez de Melgar, née Faustina Sáez y Soria (1834–1895) was a Spanish writer and journalist. She was mother of the composer and painter Gloria Melgar Sáez.
Lesbians in the Second Spanish Republic and Civil War period were doubly discriminated against, as a result of their gender and sexual practices. Prior to the Second Republic, lesbians in Spain were largely ignored, eclipsed by gay men. They faced discrimination as they challenged definitions around what it meant to be a woman. While homosexuality was not condemned by law, it was possible for lesbians to face more severe punishment when charged with violation of morals because of their sexual orientation.
Women's media in Francoist Spain suffered as a result of Francoist Spain policy. Many writers, translators and others were forced into exile, or faced stifling censorship and harassment if they remained. Spanish restrictions meant writing became one of the few acceptable occupations for women, and literate women with few other outlets for participation in Spanish society became voracious readers.
Lesbians in Francoist Spain had to contend with a culture where a fascist state met with a form of conservative Roman Catholicism to impose very rigid, traditional gender roles. In the immediate post-Civil War period, the new regime was not concerned with homosexuals in general, but instead were focused on changing laws to enforce restrictive gender norms like repealing divorce. While original laws banning homosexuality were on the books and enforced using a 1933 law, they were changed in 1954 and 1970. Unlike male homosexuality, lesbians were less clearly addressed by these laws and were much less frequently prosecuted for the crime of homosexuality. Lesbians from that period are hard to identify because they were not identified as such, and often identified as prostitutes instead.
Carolina Sanín Paz is a Colombian writer who also holds Spanish citizenship. She has published novels, essays, short stories, and children's books. She has been a professor at SUNY Purchase in the United States, and at University of Los Andes and National University of Colombia in Colombia. She has also worked as a translator, as a television host, and as a film actress. She has contributed periodical columns to several Colombian and international newspapers and magazines.
Miren Edurne Portela Camino is a Spanish historian, philologist, university professor, essayist, and novelist.
Angustias Lara Sánchez (1917–2003), commonly known as Maruja Lara, was a Spanish anarcha-feminist and syndicalist.
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