Figueres has presented the fifth volume of Benvolguts absents, the book series created with local newspaper L'EMPORDÀ and Figueres City Council. The project is written by Joan Ferrerós and Josep Valls, and focuses on people from Figueres and the surrounding area who made a contribution to local life.
The series aims to turn oral memory into a printed record. According to the authors, it moves from tacit memory, which lives in conversation and tradition, to explicit memory, which is fixed in writing and can be kept for the future.
Historians see the book as an important document for later generations. It also carries the risk of omissions, but the fact that the project continues volume by volume means details can be corrected and added over time.
Readers often recognise names and faces in the profiles, people they knew personally or saw around Figueres. That is part of the value of the series, which places everyday lives alongside better-known historical figures in the story of the town and the Alt Empordà.
One example is the section on Salvador Fàbrega. Research by historian Ramon Freixes helped recover the story of this Second World War hero, about whom little was previously known. The book aims to give proper place to those memories, along with the lives of other absents.
The project also follows a wider tradition in biography, one that gives attention to invisible lives and the background figures who support society. More volumes are expected to continue adding to this collective record of Figueres and the Alt Empordà. For more local coverage, see our news page.
