Joseph Palau-Fabre

Josep Palau i Fabre (born 21 April 1917 in Barcelona; died in the same city on 23 February 2008) was a Spanish Catalan poet and writer. He was a representative of Catalan literature during the post-World War period and a world expert on the work of Pablo Picasso. The son of a painter and decorator, towards the end of the 1930s Fabre began his literary career by writing poetry. He studied arts at the University of Barcelona, and, during the 1950s, he was an active collaborator in various literary magazines such as Poesia and Ariel as well as being an editor at the La serena publishing house. A scholarship from the French government drew Fabre to Paris in 1945, where he lived until 1951. Afterward, he revoked his Spanish citizenship so that he could be classified as a political refugee.

In addition to poetry, he wrote plays, short stories and essays, including on Picasso. His fictional world draws on eroticism, showing strong dimensions other than those of the standard idea of reality and harshly criticising the idea of a self-satisfied, mediocre society. Fabre was also an active translator, translating into Catalan works by Antonin Artaud, Arthur Rimbaud, Honoré de Balzac, and the book Letters of a Portuguese Nun. His own books have been translated into several languages.

Fabre died at the Hospital de la Vall d'Hebron in Barcelona aged 90 years and was buried in the municipal cemetery in Caldes d'Estrac.