05/05/2017

Elisa Delibes: «My father was very scared of death, which is why he talked about it so much»

Elisa Delibes, daughter of the writer Miguel Delibes, Javier Ortega, managing director of the Miguel Delibes foundation and Emilio Rosales, the director of Destino publishers discussed the life and work of the writer from Valladolid in a conference organised by the Faculty of Humanities on 2 May. 

The conference was divided into two parts: On the one hand, the daughter of the writer talked about her father’s personality and his writing method.  The writer, she explained, was very afraid of death, to such an extent that it was always a recurring theme in his books.  

The themes in his books were death and nature. He also talked about childhood, since due to the post-war period he did not have a great one.  Elisa Delibes told many anecdotes about her father, such as his hobby of drawing caricatures, which continued until the day he died.  

During the second half of the event, Javier Ortega Álvarez, introduced the Foundation, it’s mission and how it works. The Foundation was set up in 2011, on the first anniversary of the writer’s death.  

The Delibes Foundation is in charge of gathering together and maintaining the writer’s legacy, as well as studying and disseminating his work. It also promotes and supports studies into the themes that were constant in his life and literary work, such as social justice, Christian humanism, responsible journalism and the observation of nature.