It is a small miracle that Bellver is twenty years old. Since that November 1, 1996, so many things have changed in society and in the worlds of journalism and culture that the survival of these eight weekly pages, with the sole support of the newspaper that publishes it, Diario de Mallorca, is a good proof of the commitment of the communication group that publishes it, Editorial Prensa Ibérica, with cultural creation in its most varied fields.
Francisco Díaz de Castro was the leading signature in the first issue of Bellver, and this choice also reflects the will to connect with the world of the University, often distanced, due to prejudice, from media that some consider too banal for their scientific claims. Díaz de Castro is a perfect example of how scientific criteria, rigor and the ability to disseminate can be compatible and mutually enriching.
In essence, Bellver’s objective has not changed, because we continue trying to reflect or disseminate cultural content, preferably literary content, that is useful or enriching for our readers. Bellver is a redoubt that has survived two decades of tremendous upheavals in the world of culture, twenty years so intense and complex, as a consequence of the digital revolution, that they have forced us to redefine the entire cultural industry, with positive consequences and other very conflicting.
In the midst of this storm, Bellver has witnessed the apocalyptic predictions about the publishing industry and also the current hangover that questions those predictions and allows us to contemplate a certain resurrection, although at the cost of blood, sweat and tears.
The same could be said, with the peculiarities of each area, of music, plastic arts, theater or the rest of the cultural fronts that, like the whole of our society, adapt their structure and try to survive in an environment that is almost every day with the new technological options that affect the forms of production, dissemination, intellectual property and commercial benefits that guarantee the future.
In Bellver, in a tenacious manner, without stridency or intellectual arrogance, a cultural imprint has been established in which the trace of a good part of the creation generated in the bridge between two centuries remains. We were born at the end of the 20th century and it is already 16 years of the 21st in which we have fulfilled the weekly commitment with our readers.
In all this time, there is a permanent presence, that of Biel Mesquida, who began with his “Mapamundi d’ultrasons” and continues with his “Plagueta de notes”. Mesquida is a good reference of how a creator is able to adapt to the possibilities of new technologies and take advantage of them while remaining faithful to the essence of his creative task.
Together with him, hundreds of authors, critics, journalists, photographers, cartoonists and designers have placed the tiles of this mosaic, which was conceived, paraphrasing Núria Espert, during her recent speech upon receiving the Princess of Asturias Award for the Arts, in the two languages we love, Catalan and Spanish. As a tribute to all of them, I will cite the first line-up from twenty years ago. In addition to the aforementioned Díaz de Castro, Miguel Vicens, Pau, María Jesús Díez, Miquel Cardell, Javier Cuervo, Matías Vallés, Luis G. Iberni, Biel Amer and Biel Mesquida were there, in strict order of appearance. José Carlos Llop was also there, although under a pseudonym, and I would have liked to have had the masterly writing of Andrés Ferret, but, due to one of those dark corners of life, he left us just the day before the first Bellver was published. Jeroni Salom and Eduardo Jordá joined the second issue, with their unforgettable section “Para que bailan los osos”. Camilo José Cela Conde opened the third number and continues to enrich the contents of Diario de Mallorca every week.
Literature, art, music, science, poetry, and also comics. Florentino Flórez wonders in these same pages why this unusual presence and survival of a comics critic in our supplement, very unusual in this country. The answer is found in the first number with the signature of Javier Cuervo, who, for a happy arabesque of life, has just been the protagonist of a review of Florentino in last week’s issue of Bellver, as the author of a jewel entitled “Flash Gordon the Conqueror.”
Conceiving Bellver, naming it and coordinating it directly during its first four years was a stupendous adventure. Then Josep Joan Roselló, Carlos Garrido and Francesc M. Rotger took over, who in the last eight years has piloted this ship with success and great dedication, whose maintenance afloat in times of convulsion in the journalistic industry has been a remarkable exercise of imagination, pragmatism and synergies with the whole of our publishing group.
From the first issue I tried to make independence guide the contents of Bellver. Without prejudices, without priorisms, without impositions for personal or commercial interests, with the inevitable subjectivity of a task that must be counterbalanced by intellectual honesty. And when writing this last concept, I think that it may be a good moment to reveal something that during these twenty years I have been asked on a recurring basis: Why is the supplement called Bellver? The answer is: By Jovellanos. By the man, the brilliant and honest intellectual and politician who remained in exile in the castle between 1802 and 1808 and was able to write there the key works for the history of Mallorca, which are the Description of the Bellver castle and its views, and the texts about the Gothic architectural jewels of the cathedral, the fish market, San Francisco and Santo Domingo. Jovellanos is one of the symbols of the Enlightenment who was capable, at the forefront of the European mentality, of working tirelessly for culture, education and the ideas that should transform this country and that cost him so dearly.
In times when culture seems besieged by politics, Jovellanos is a symbol of resistance against the injustice of power, and his love for Mallorca led him to write essential texts for the history of this land, despite the conditions in which he arrived as a prisoner of State, first to the Valldemossa Charterhouse, and then to Bellver, so that the isolation and punishment would be greater. He learned Catalan, read the works of Ramon Llull, and left us a legacy that represents a “prodigy of documentary accuracy”, in the words of Professor Caso, the great expert on the work of Jovellanos.
That’s why Bellver, for the idea of cultural resistance even in the hardest times for the light side of life.
