The Complete Prose Works of Rafael Masó Published in a New Volume

Wednesday, September 30, 2026

The Josep Pla Collection of the Diputació de Girona presents the book "Rafael Masó: Obra en prosa. Reposada, equilibrada i magistralment vibrant"

The Diputació de Girona and the Fundació Rafael Masó yesterday presented the book "Rafael Masó: Obra en prosa. Reposada, equilibrada i magistralment vibrant" (Prose Works. Poised, Balanced, and Masterfully Vibrant) at the Girona headquarters of the Col·legi d'Arquitectes de Catalunya. For the first time, the volume brings together the complete body of prose that the architect published during his lifetime. The presentation was given by Dr Margarida Casacuberta, Professor of Catalan Philology at the University of Girona, together with Joan-Lluís Lluís, director of the Josep Pla Collection of the Diputació de Girona, and Jordi Falgàs, director of the Fundació and editor of the volume. The event was chaired by Joan Arnau, Culture Officer of COAC-Girona, and Natàlia Figueras, member of the Diputació de Girona responsible for Human Resources and Housing.

In addition to being an architect, Rafael Masó is also known for the poetry he wrote in his youth, which was clearly influenced by his friends Josep Carner and Guerau de Liost. Less well known, however, is his long career as a writer of articles and essays, a body of prose literature that this volume brings together in its entirety for the first time. It comprises 107 articles, chronicles, reviews, commentaries, poetic prose pieces, glosses, and lectures dating from 1902 to 1935. The edition and introduction to the collection were prepared by Jordi Falgàs, director of the Fundació, while the editorial criteria and philological revision were undertaken by Agnès Prats.

In her presentation, Margarida Casacuberta began by stating that "this is an important book." According to Casacuberta, the volume makes it possible to gain a fuller understanding of the central and fundamental role Masó played in Girona's cultural and political construction and regeneration during the first third of the twentieth century. Casacuberta stressed that the texts by Masó collected in the book constitute "a great ode to Girona" and reveal the architect's intellectual, artistic, and political commitment "to creating a modern Girona, part of a national project, a European Girona, in a process that runs from 1902 until his death in 1935."

Lluc Salellas i Vilar, Mayor of Girona and president of the Fundació Rafael Masó, highlighted that "to our reading of Masó the poet, we can now add our reading of Masó the essayist and lecturer. Taken together, these writings reveal an intellectual figure of well-deserved importance in Catalan culture during the first third of the twentieth century. Above all, the guiding thread of Masó's prose, his constant concern, was his 'most beloved city', the 'old walled city' that he wanted to protect, preserve, and at the same time modernize, and its citizens, whom he sought to lift out of 'the greyness' and ignorance through culture, education, and critical thinking."

Masó emerges as a prolific writer who published in various journals and newspapers throughout his life, revealing an evolution in his prose that parallels the development of his architecture, from Modernisme to Noucentisme. A fervent admirer of Eugeni d'Ors's Glosari, Masó also wrote on a wide range of subjects with the same determination to make an impact on the Girona of his time. The texts reveal a critical thinker concerned with the visual arts, music, heritage, and politics, and together they provide a comprehensive overview of his thought.