Manel Rodríguez-Castelló (Alcoi, 1958), a poet and essayist, studied Hispanic Philology at the University of Valencia and, from 1983 to 2018, was a secondary school Catalan teacher.

He is author of some twenty books, eleven of them poetry collections with titles including La ciutat del tràngol (winner of the Vicent Andrés Estellés Poetry Prize, 1978), Lletra per a un àlbum (Maria-Mercè Marçal Poetry prize, 2005), Estranyament (Ausiàs March Poetry Prize, 2013), and Passatge (2022).

He has translated from English into Catalan poems by the Scottish poet Norman MacCaig and, from Basque, the anthology of Basque poets Muga (2021), as well as the collection of poems by Teresa Irastortza Glosak / Glossar el món (2024).

Since 2019, he has been writing weekly opinion columns for the daily Diari La Veu del País Valencià and, since 2006, has edited a page of literary criticism in the magazine Saó. His journalistic output amounts to some 2,000 columns, some of which have been published in several volumes as well as in his blog, “La pedra i el marge”. Most of his literary essays are collected in the book Estimats poetes (2025). He has also published a book of aphorisms, Farem un pensament (metaforismes i saials) (2021).

He is a member of the Associació d’Escriptors en Llengua Catalana (AELC – Association of Catalan Language Writers).

Web page: Bet Ajenjo for AELC.
Documentation: Author’s personal files.
Photograph: © Jesús Prats.
Translation: Julie Wark.