ABSTRACT
This chapter looks at two of Manuel de Pedrolo's novels, one of which was written in 1965, and the other over a decade later, in 1976. Both were published about two years after completion—a comparatively short gap, given that some of Pedrolo's work had to wait two decades for publication. Totes les besties de carrega and D'esquerra a dreta, respectivament were produced at very different points both in Catalonia's history and in Pedrolo's personal development as a novelist. For Pedrolo, whose protagonists have always tended to be males whose quests inevitably involve intense relationships with women, it is not surprising that a woman rather than a man should represent the nation. Pedrolo never knew his own mother, since she died when he was 2 years old, and he was brought up by his father and an aunt. The name 'Jordi' has obvious patriotic connotations for a Catalan, since Sant Jordi is the Patron Saint of Catalonia.
