The governments presided over by the independentist Pere Aragonès and the socialists Ximo Puig and Francina Armengol pay tribute this Saturday to Joan Fuster, considered the inventor of the entelechy of the “Catalan countries”.
The executives of Catalonia, the Valencian Community and the Balearic Islands have declared 2022 as “Joan Fuster Year” on the occasion of the centenary of the birth of the essayist, who coined the formula of “Catalan countries” in his work “Nosaltres els valencians”.
In 1962, Joan Fuster put into circulation the term “Catalan countries” with political intent. Specifically, the writer argued that the “Catalan-speaking” territories of what he called the “Valencian Country” would have as their only “normal future” the incorporation into a “supra-regional” entity, which he described as “Catalan countries.”
This Saturday, the Minister of Education of the Generalitat Valenciana, Raquel Tamarit, together with her Catalan counterpart, Natàlia Garriga, and the Minister of European Funds, University and Culture of the Government of the Balearic Islands, Miquel Company, attend the institutional commemoration of the centenary of Joan Fuster.
At the end of the event, which will be held in the town of Sueca, the day will continue with a gathering in which will participate the deputy commissioner of the Any Joan Fuster in the Valencian Community, Voro Ortells, the commissioner of the Balearic Islands, Fina Salord, and the curator of the activities of the Joan Fuster Year in Catalonia, Enric Sòria.
The term “Catalan countries” coined by Joan Fuster sixty years ago still aspires today to group together, from a geopolitical point of view, a fictitious reality according to which Catalonia, the Valencian Community, the Balearic Islands, the eastern fringe of Aragon, Andorra, French Roussillon, Italian Alghero (in Sardinia) and El Carche (in the northeast corner of Murcia) should form a distinct and independent country.
The pretext for giving birth to this entelechy is that, from the standpoint of the separatists, the Catalan language is used in all these territories. In addition, in the case of San Juan, the excuse to propagate the idea of a “national day of the Catalan countries” is the proliferation of celebrations around the date of June 24 in Catalonia, the Balearic Islands and the Valencian Community.
