From the Club dels Novel·listes to the Comissió de les Lletres Catalanes: the relationship between writers and trade unions during the “belle époque des songes socialo-communistes”

Abstract

The conditions imposed by the social revolution that broke out in Barcelona after July 19, 1936, forced all workers’ organizations to join one of the two majority unions: UGT or CNT. Those trades, like that of writers, that until then had not seen the need to unionize had to create the minimum structures to satisfy the compulsory unionization. Several attempts were made between the last weeks of July and the first weeks of August to carry out this syndication of literary authors. The only one that would succeed and become hegemonic was the Agrupació d’Escriptors Ca­talans (AEC), which would take advantage of a previous associative struc­ture, the Club dels Novel·listes, to adapt to the new revolutionary times and join the UGT. The fit of writers to a trade union structure would not be simple. The Departament d’Edicions of the Secretaria de Treball Col·lectiu (UGT-CNT) began to issue clear warnings against the AEC in Oc­tober 1936, questioning some of its primary activities. To get out of this impasse, the writers began a quick approach to the Departament de Cultu­ra by asking the Culture minister to create a Comitè d’Edicions Catalanes and transforming it immediately into the Comissió de les Lletres Catala­nes, prelude of the Institució de les Lletres Catalanes.