1. Biography
Literature
Awards
Translations
2. Párpados (novel, 2017)
Back cover text for Párpados
What they say about Párpados
3. El cielo y la nada (poetry, 2019)
Back cover text for El cielo y la nada
What they say about El cielo y la nada
About Toni Quero’s poetry
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1. BIOGRAPHY
Toni Quero (Sabadell) has a degree in Spanish Language and Literature and works as an editor. His first book, the collection of poems Los adolescentes furtivos [The Furtive Adolescents], was awarded the Antonio Machado International Literature Prize in 2009 in Collioure. Translated into French, it was published in a bilingual edition with a prologue by Pere Gimferrer.
In 2016 his book Párpados [Eyelids] won the III Dos Passos Award for a First Novel. It was published in 2017 by Galaxia Gutenberg. The Festival du Premier Roman de Chambéry praised it as one of the finest first novels published in Spanish. In 2020 Párpados was selected to take part in the event “Rodando Páginas. Los libros van a las pantallas” [Shooting Pages. Books on Screen] for its potential to be adapted to the audiovisual format.
In 2018 it won one of the Montserrat Roig Awards for authors. This award, convened by Barcelona City Council as part of its UNESCO Barcelona City of Literature programme, was granted for the seeds of what would eventually become his second novel.
In 2019, his second book of poems, El cielo y la nada [Heaven and Nothing] won the XXXII Tiflos Poetry Award, run by the ONCE charity. Editorial Castalia have published this work.
He is represented by Dos Passos Literature and Communication Agency:
www.dospassos.es
He is responsible for the page devoted to the translation of Catalan Poetry «Foc creuat / Fuego cruzado [/ Crossfire]»
https://foccreuat.wordpress.com
More information at:
www.toniquero.com
Literature:
—El cielo y la nada. XXXII Tiflos Poetry Award. Castalia Ediciones. Barcelona, 2019.
https://www.castalia.es/libros/1059/el-cielo-y-la-nada
—Párpados. III Dos Passos Award for a First Novel. Ed. Galaxia Gutenberg, Barcelona, 2017.
http://www.galaxiagutenberg.com/libros/parpados/
—Los adolescentes furtivos / Les adolescents furtifs. Antonio Machado International Literature Award 2009. Prologue by Pere Gimferrer. Translation into French by Renada-Laura Portet. Cap Béar Éditions, Perpiñán, 2010.
Awards:
—XXXII Tiflos Poetry Award for El Cielo y la nada (2019)
—III Dos Passos Award for a First Novel for Párpados (2016).
—Antonio Machado International Literature Award for Los adolescentes furtivos (2009)
Translations:
—Les adolescents furtifs / Los adolescentes furtivos. Antonio Machado International Literature Award 2009. Prologue by Pere Gimferrer. Translation into French by Renada-Laura Portet. Bilingual edition in Spanish/French. Cap Béar Éditions, Perpiñán, 2010.
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2. PÁRPADOS (novel, 2017)
Back cover text for Párpados:
Duna and her boyfriend move to the desolate and eerie landscape of the Ebro delta at the start of June with the aim of working through the summer in a local restaurant, and to strengthen their relationship. Soon, however, their boredom and frustration drive them to set off on a motorbike towards the north of Europe, on a trip that takes them to Paris and Copenhagen. On this journey, as they burn through the kilometres and their meagre savings, Duna tries to capture a fading reality in her sketchbook while her partner, in contrast, captures life through the lens of a camera. The sea, the rain and the winding Atlantic coast form the recurring backdrop to this search for a place in the world. Theirs is a broken journey in which they come across strange characters, revisit old loves and try to distance themselves from a past that spreads out behind them like an oil slick on the road.
Written in an agile, fractured prose with abundant verbal resources, Párpados is a first-person narration of an inner journey as well as a physical one. In the course of a hundred days, the young couple cross chaotic cities, natural parks and back roads in a continuous movement that will force them to face their fears, to make plans for the future and eventually, change their lives. Párpados is the discovery of an author with a powerful voice and a wealth of startling images, the chronicle of a restless time, of promises and broken dreams, in a Europe that is both harsh and homely.
What they say about Párpados:
“In this sense, because of its topicality, its vivisection of alienation, of precariousness and instability, we can say that this is a work of this generation.”
Pilar Adón, Zenda
“In the best tradition of coming-of-age novels, an exploration of inner landscapes and abysses, and a lesson on the impossibility of recovering that which we have lost.”
Luis Bagué Quílez, Información
“This novel (intense in its rhythm, disturbing in its emotional swings, surprising in its dramatic changes of pace) deserves more than a superficial reading.”
Tino Pertierra, La Nueva España
“The novel conjures up an emotional, sentimental and existential world in a hundred brief chapters, a hundred days, a hundred deeply-felt moments. A hundred pieces in the puzzle of life.”
Winston Manrique Sabogal, WMagazín
«That this is Toni Quero’s first novel comes as a surprise, because it shows none of the tentativeness of a beginner. Párpados is a solid novel, melancholic, cinematic and of its generation. It is a very enjoyable read.»
David Pérez Vega, Eñe
“In its minimalism, the simplicity of its story could remind you of McCarthy’s The Road: boy and girl set off from the Ebro delta towards Europe. The journey provides the background music as they perpetually waver between the sensation of freedom and aimlessness.”
Eduardo Laporte, El Correo
«What this first novel gets right is its vision and the beauty of its language.»
Guillermo Busutil, La Opinión de Málaga
“Párpados tells the story of two months from a magical and devastating summer.”
Rafael-José Díaz, Quimera
“Párpados deserves a positive reception for its well-judged fragmentation, with skilful dominion of ellipsis and flashbacks in setting out the chronological arrangement of the narration, for its straightforward style and its verbal dexterity in a number of lexical fields.”
Ángel Basanta, El Cultural
“That such an excellent novel should be its author’s first is surprising, considering the skill on display in its pages, which contain many memorable passages.”
Miguel Barrero, Zenda
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3. EL CIELO Y LA NADA (poetry, 2019)
Back cover text for El cielo y la nada:
The frontiers between reason and madness, reality and desire, love and nostalgia are so nebulous that we often cross them without knowing which of these worlds we are in. El cielo y la nada, takes image and metaphor as its foundation to explore both sides of the mirror, in a book that engages with tradition and the avant-garde.
What they say about El cielo y la nada:
“El cielo y la nada leads us away from our apparent contentment to show us new worlds of expression.”
Ángel Luis Prieto de Paula at the Tiflos awards event
«A multi-faceted work that finds a point of connection between culture and life.»
“It is complex poetry that does not shy away from the achievements of the avant-garde while retaining the pulse of the real world.”
Manuel Rico, Babelia
“El cielo y la nada is the exceptional reconstruction of a nomadic identity and a lost world.”
“Another notable aspect of the book is its expressive texture, with alternating verse and prose, strophic placement and daring pirouettes that verge on visual poetry. (…) El cielo y la nada confirms Toni Quero as an explorer of the unusual, a 21st century fláneur and the last of the romantics, someone who aspires to frame a moment for all eternity simply by naming it.”
Luis Bagué Quílez, Información
«Quero has the talent to create lasting images, snapshots that stay with you. He has created a world that weaves into itself and reaches out to find new connections to become immense, overwhelming.»
“We need only read poems as memorable as ‘Las horas del día’ to see that he is a powerful, suggestive author. A worthy recipient of the latest Tiflos poetry award.”
Álex Chico, Quimera
«Quero maintains a tense energy between the autobiographical bite of the poem and the reflective flow of his language. The result is a speculative diary that reaches deep into his experiences and his imaginary spaces. The poem probes, speaks and expresses with images of great symbolic force, and follows the traces of disappointment.”
José Luis Morante, Infolibre
«He is a poet who can gauge the use of space and time in his poems perfectly.”
“Poets like Toni Quero enable poetry to recover its equilibrium.”
Enrique Villagrasa, Librújula
“We can sense the symptoms of a generation that has lost hope and wanders between nostalgia and disillusion.”
Azahara Palomeque, El Periódico de Extremadura
«His poems seem to explode somewhere far off, but you can taste the bitter sting of gunpowder on your lips.»
Xavier Rodríguez Ruera, Quimera
About Toni Quero’s poetry:
«What stands out here, without a doubt, is that which has always and everywhere distinguished a real poet: the gift of the precise, true image.»
Pere Gimferrer, in the prologue of Los adolescentes furtivos
“The proficiency of the language on display here tells us that the arrival of this poet is one that requires us to sit up and take notice.”
Túa Blesa, El Cultural
Toni Quero 