Gili, Joan (1907-1998)

Papers of Joan Gili, 1844-1997, comprise Catalonia: press-cuttings, leaflets regarding cultural events; some minutes, circulars of the Anglo-Catalan society, 1976-1995; leaflets by British-based exiles protesting against Spanish government; Monserrat manifesto, 1970; memoranda on Catalonia to international organizations, 1950s; posters from Barcelona, 1844-c 1933.

Joan Gili was born into a publishing family in Barcelona in 1907 and emigrated to Britain in 1934. He helped found the Dolphin bookshop near Charing Cross Road, London and began his career as a publisher of Hispanic works in 1938. In the following year, Stephen Spender and Gili produced a translation of Nadal's selection of Lorca's poems. Gili wrote the influential "Introductory Catalan Grammar" in 1943. Several volumes of his translations of Catalan poems were published in the next few decades. Gili became a founding member of the Anglo-Catalan Society in 1954 and was later its president. He was also known as the "unofficial consul of the Catalans in Britain". Gili died in 1998.

Arranged in original order.

Open for research

Joan Gili family

Collection level description

Compiled by Richard Temple.

Copies may be made, subject to the condition of the original and to the provisions of copyright law. Copying must be undertaken by the Palaeography Room staff, who will need a minimum of 24 hours to process requests.

Bought by Senate House Library in 2002.