We present here excerpts from the novel Amigo (2022) by the acclaimed Spanish author and academic Ana Merino. The novel is largely based on Merino’s own experiences and career: Inés, the protagonist, like Merino herself, was invited by poet Joaquín Amigo’s granddaughter to organize his papers in Madrid—a professor and intellectual, Amigo was, along with his friends Federico García Lorca and Luis Rosales, a member of the group of avant-garde Spanish poets and artists in the 1920s. Amigo [friend], then, refers both to Inés’s/Ana’s own friendships and to those of Amigo and his contemporaries. The excerpts presented here in English translation relate to Merino’s work with the Joaquín Amigo papers, which are of great interest to scholars and remain unpublished [Adapted from the introduction written by the translator, Lynn M. Shirey].
