Arturo Perez-Reverte

Arturo Pérez-Reverte Gutiérrez (Cartagena, November 25, 1951) is a Spanish writer and journalist, member of the Royal Spanish Academy since 2003. Former RTVE correspondent and prominent reporter in various conflicts Armed Forces and Wars, he is the author, among others, of the saga The Adventures of Captain Alatriste and the Falcó trilogy.

Biography

He attended the 4th year of Baccalaureate in the former Maristas of Cartagena. From there he went to the Isaac Peral Institute, where he completed his baccalaureate in the Literature branch with twelve other classmates and a group of young professors (Amparo Ibáñez in Art History, Gloria Sánchez Palomero in Greek, Antonio Gil in Latin and Juan Ros in Literature). There he participated in Proa , the institute magazine, his first journalistic activity. ^{[citation needed ]}

He graduated in Journalism from the Complutense University of Madrid. During the first three years of this career he studied Political Science at the same time. He worked as a war reporter for 21 years (1973-1994). He took his first steps in the newspaper Pueblo , where he stayed for 12 years. In 1977, parallel to this work, he founded the magazine Defensa together with his partner Vicente Talón, which appeared on sale in April 1978, and of which he was chief editor until his commitments as a correspondent they forced him to leave her. After the disappearance of Pueblo he went to Televisión Española (TVE), where he would work as a correspondent for another nine years until 1994.

At the beginning of the 1990s, he presented La ley de la calle on RNE, a radio program, at night, in which there was room for numerous characters from various fields, most of them sometimes marginal, and which was closed by Jordi García Candau, director of RTVE.^{[citation required]} He was the presenter, in 1993, of the program Código uno, about the news of the black chronicle, on Televisión Española, a program that he publicly disowned and abandoned because he considered that it contained "garbage". After having made those statements in November of that year, in Pamplona, and returning to work as a war reporter, Pérez-Reverte submitted his resignation to TVE in April 1994, upon learning that he was intended to "open a file for justifying expenses in war zones with false invoices", an accusation based on some lines from his novel Comanche Territory. In a harsh letter to Ramón Colom, director of TVE, Pérez-Reverte invited him to read the book "in detail" to verify that there was no basis for the file, and he said he had the impression that this, which he considers "nonsense », is inspired by people who «act in bad faith and intend to take revenge for some allusions they do not like». His resignation letter ended like this: «Fuck you, Ramón. To you and to Jordi García Candau».

Sarajevo site. The Yugoslav wars are very present in the works of Pérez-Reverte as Comanche territory and The battle painter.

As he explained in Comanche Territory, he said goodbye in disgust due to the lack of resources and the politicization of television. As a war correspondent, he had covered armed conflicts in Cyprus, Lebanon, Eritrea, the Sahara, the Malvinas, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Chad, Libya, Sudan, Mozambique, Angola, the Persian Gulf, Croatia, Bosnia, etc. Although of all of them, the Eritrean War of 1977 marked him in particular (he cites it on several occasions in his articles and in his novel Comanche Territory ), in which he was missing for several months and managed to survive harshly. sorrows thanks to his guerrilla friends; On that occasion, although he does not give details about the event, he says that he had to defend his life with weapons.

After resigning from RTVE, he abandoned his job as a journalist and dedicated himself exclusively to literature and, especially, to historical novels. His first novel, which he had published in 1986, with modest success, was The Hussar, set in the 19th century, which was followed two years later by The fencing teacher, whose action takes place in Galdosian Madrid. This novel was chosen among the 100 best novels in Spanish of the 20th century by the newspaper El Mundo. It was followed by The Dumas Club and The Flanders Table, which made him famous. Already a successful writer, he published Captain Alatriste in 1996, a novel that would begin the saga that has made Pérez-Reverte a bestseller. Which is not surprising, since Alatriste's gestation was related to this discipline: the author, «when he saw the space dedicated to the Golden Age in the high school books of his daughter Carlota —with whom he signs the first volume—, He decided to create a character who would tell a crucial moment in our history, without which our present cannot be understood".

He has so far published more than 30 novels and several collections of articles. Some of them have been successfully adapted to the cinema, such as: The fencing master, The table of Flanders and The Dumas club which, Shot by Roman Polanski, it was marketed under the title The Ninth Door. In 2006 the film Alatriste, by Agustín Díaz Yanes, was released, based on his novel series of Captain Alatriste and, the following year, La carta esférica, directed by Imanol Uribe.

Regarding his recognitions as a writer, it is worth mentioning his entry into the Royal Spanish Academy on June 12, 2003, to occupy the T chair (vacant since the death of the philologist Manuel Alvar in 2001) or his appointment as doctor honoris causa by the Polytechnic University of Cartagena, the first awarded by that higher education establishment, on February 18, 2004.

The adaptation of his work La Reina del Sur into a telenovela format, in Spanish and premiered by Telemundo, was a success in the United States, but in Spain it did not have very favorable reviews and Pérez-Reverte himself came to harshly criticize the broadcast and the treatment given to the adaptation on the social network Twitter.

In May 2011, the Provincial Court of Madrid sentenced Pérez-Reverte and Manuel Palacios, director and co-writer of the film Gitano, respectively, to pay 80,000 euros in solidarity to the filmmaker Antonio González-Vigil, who sued him for plagiarism of the script of the film released in 2000. The sentence contradicted two previous criminal sentences and a third from a commercial court, favorable to Pérez-Reverte and Palacios. Finally, in July 2013, he was sentenced by the Provincial Court of Madrid to pay the filmmaker 200,000 euros for plagiarism. On July 16, 2013, the screenwriter and film director Antonio González-Vigil requested the dismissal of Pérez-Reverte as academic of the Royal Spanish Academy. Pérez-Reverte published an article in July 2013 where he offered his point of view on the sentence.

Since June 6, 1993, he has written a column in the Sunday supplement El Semanal, now XLSemanal, called Patente de corso, which began as In cold blood, although he had already published some articles sporadically in this same magazine in 1991. At the end of 1995, Arturo Pérez-Reverte himself said of this series of columns:

« In these two and a half years I have been dismissing at ease, and - as my compadre Sancho Gracia at the Teatro Español de Madrid says for these dates - neither did I recognize sacred, nor in distinguishing I have stopped the clergy of the second. That's why my weekly account settings can be described as anything less comfortable for those who host them. »

In 2016 he founded the literary magazine Zenda, whose title is inspired by the novel The Prisoner of Zenda, by Anthony Hope. The purpose of the publication is to disseminate content related to the world of letters (interviews with writers, book reviews, current news, creation texts, etc.). In 2019, under the protection of the magazine, he created the publishing label Zenda Aventura, dedicated to the publication of adventure novels with prefaces by Pérez-Reverte and with illustrations by Augusto Ferrer Dalmau. Also in 2016 Falcó was published, a novel about an agent of the Francoist side during the war Spanish civilian who is entrusted with the mission of freeing José Antonio Primo de Rivera from prison.

In 2017, he made his debut in the world of podcasting, writing scripts for Welcome to Dangerous Life, a sound fiction available on Podium Podcast, PRISA Radio's podcast network. Directed by Guillermo Arriaga and starring Juan Echanove, among others, it is about a Spanish philosophy professor who becomes involved in a drug trafficking plot during his trip to Mexico.

In March 2019, Pérez-Reverte published A history of Spain, a compilation of 91 numbered articles with the same title that had been appearing at the rate of one every two or three weeks in his Sunday column Marquee letter.

In 2020 he published The Cyclops' Cave, a compilation of some 6,000 of his Twitter messages about literature, written on said social network since he opened an account on it in 2010. This work is only available as an e-book.

In September 2021, Pérez-Reverte published the novel The Italian, set during World War II, about a group of Italian soldiers trying to sabotage Allied ships in Gibraltar.

Literary works

Narrative

The sea is one of the great protagonists in his work. Perez-Reverte is a yacht captain and spends part of his time sailing.

• The humsar, Akal, Madrid, 1986 (revision: Alfaguara, Madrid, 2004)
• The teacher of fencing, Mondadori, Madrid, 1988
• The table of Flanders, Alfaguara, Madrid, 1990
• The Dumas Club or The shadow of Richelieu, Alfaguara, Madrid, 1993
• The shadow of the eagle, Alfaguara, Madrid, 1993
• Comanche territory, Ollero and Ramos, Madrid / Seix Barral, Mexico, 1994
• A matter of honor (Cachito), account, Alfaguara, Madrid, 1995
• The skin of the drum, Alfaguara, Madrid, 1995
• The spherical letter, Alfaguara, Madrid, 2000
• The Queen of the South, Alfaguara, Madrid, 2002
• Corporal Trafalgar, Alfaguara, Madrid, 2004
• The battle painter, Alfaguara, Madrid, 2006
• A cholera day, Alfaguara, Madrid, 2007
• Blue eyes, story with prologue by Pere Gimferrer and illustrations by Sergio Sandoval; Seix Barral, Barcelona, 2009 (formerly published in the press).
• The siege, Alfaguara, Madrid, 2010
• The tango of the old guard, Alfaguara, Madrid, 2012
• Patient sniper, Alfaguara, Madrid, 2013

Alexandre Dumas is one of the authors that most influenced the writer.

• Good men, Alfaguara, Madrid, 2015
• The Civil War Counted on Young Peoplewith illustrations by Fernando Vicente; Alfaguara, Madrid, 2015
• Hard dogs don't dance, Alfaguara, Madrid, 2018
• Sidi, story about Rodrigo Díaz de Vivar. Alfaguara, Madrid, 2019
• Fire line, Alfaguara, Madrid, 2020.
• The Italian, Alfaguara, Madrid, 2021.
• Revolution (novela), Alfaguara, Madrid, 2022.

Series The adventures of Captain Alatriste

1. Captain Alatriste, Alfaguara, Madrid, 1996
2. Blood cleaning, Alfaguara, Madrid, 1997
3. The Sun of Breda, Alfaguara, Madrid, 1998
4. The gold of the king, Alfaguara, Madrid, 2000
5. The Knight of the Yellow Bumble, Alfaguara, Madrid, 2003
6. Corsarios de Levante, Alfaguara, Madrid, 2006
7. The Killer Bridge, Alfaguara, Madrid, 2011

Series Falcó

• Falco, Alfaguara, Madrid, 2016
• Eva, Alfaguara, Madrid, 2017
• Sabotage, Alfaguara, Madrid, 2018

Articles

• Short workstories and articles; Alfaguara, Madrid, 1995
• Corsoon Patent (1993-1998); Alfaguara, Madrid, 1998
• In the spirit of offense (1998-2001); Alfaguara, Madrid, 2001
• You won't fuck me alive. (2001-2005); Alfaguara, Madrid, 2005
• When we were honored mercenaries (2005-2009); Alfaguara, Madrid, 2009
• The ships are lost on land (1994-2011); Alfaguara, Madrid, 2011
• Dogs and sons of bitch, Alfaguara, Madrid, 2014
• A History of Spain (2013-2017); Alfaguara, Madrid, 2019

Own scripts

• Camino de Santiago (1999). Television series led by Robert Young.
• Gypsy (2000). Film directed by Manuel Palacios. In 2011 the Provincial Court of Madrid considered it a plagiarism Purple heartsAntonio González-Vigil.
• The dragon (2019). Mexican telenovela, produced by W Studios in co-production with Lemon Studios for Televisa and Netflix in 2019.

Accommodations

Cinema

• The teacher of fencing (1992), led by Pedro Olea. Adaptation of the homonymous novel.
• The table of Flanders (1994), led by Jim McBride. Adaptation of the homonymous novel.
• Cachito (1995), directed by Enrique Urbizu and based on the story A matter of honor (Cachito).
• Comanche territory (1997), directed by Gerardo Herrero. Adaptation of the homonymous novel.
• The ninth door (1999), led by Roman Polański. Adaptation of the novel The Dumas Club.
• Alatriste (2006), directed by Agustín Díaz Yanes. Adaptation of the first novels The Adventures of Captain Alatriste.
• The spherical letter (2007), led by Imanol Uribe. Adaptation of the homonymous novel.
• Gold (2017), directed by Agustín Díaz Yanes. Adaptation of a short story by Arturo Pérez Reverte.
• The skin of the drum (2022), led by Sergio Dow. Adaptation of the homonymous novel.

Television

• Quart. The Man of Rome (2007). 6 chapter television series based on the protagonist of The skin of the drum. Directed by Jacobo Rispa and issued by Antena 3.
• The queen of the south (2011). Mexican television series based on Arturo Pérez Reverte's homonymous novel.
• The Adventures of Captain Alatriste (2015). Spanish television series that adapted the homonym series of books. Emitted by Telecinco.
• Queen of the South (South Queen) (2016). U.S. television series that adapted Arturo Pérez Reverte's homonymous novel based on the 2011 Mexican series.

Comic

• Captain Alatriste (Children's Comic), illustrations by David Jiménez, Alfaguara, 2002
• Captain Alatriste, script by Carlos Giménez and drawing by Joan Mundet, Debolsillo, 2005
• Blood cleaning, script by Carlos Giménez and drawing by Joan Mundet, Debolsillo, 2008
• The shadow of the eagle, screenplay and drawings by Rubén del Rincón, Galland Books, 2012
• Long live the Pepa! Adventure in comic, guion of Hernan Migoya and drawing of Rubén del Rincón, XLSemanal, 2012

Scripts for audio series

• Welcome to dangerous life, Podium Pódcast (PRISA Radio), 2017

Awards and distinctions

• Goya Award 1992 to the best script adapted by The teacher of fencing (co-written with Francisco Prada, Antonio Larreta and Pedro Olea)
• Grand Prix of Police Literature of France by The Dumas Club (1993)
• The magazine Lire choose Perez-Reverte as one of the top ten foreign novelists in France by The table of Flanders (1993)
• Medalla Laureada del Cantón de Cartagena, awarded by the Cantonal Party of Cartagena (1993)
• Asturias Prize for Journalism 1993 for its coverage for TVE of the war of the former Yugoslavia
• Ondas 1993 Spanish National Radio Award for the program Street law
• Swedish Academy Award from Novela Detectivesca to Best Foreign Translation by The Table of Flanders (1994)
• The New York Times Book Review Date The table of Flanders as one of the top five foreign novels published in the United States (1994)
• Palle Rosenkranz 1994 Award (administered by the Danish Criminological Academy) The Dumas Club
• The table of Flanders is nominated by the Swedish Academy for Detection as one of the best thrillers translated into Sweden (1995)
• Journal readers’ award Elle to the best book of fiction by The skin of the drum (1995)
• World Tourism Day Award of the City of Seville, for having placed the action The skin of the drum in that city (1996)
• Jean Monnet Prize for European Literature 1997 by The skin of the drum
• Grupo Correo Award to human values, for their professional work and social projection, as one of the most read writers in Spain and more translated (1997)
• Knight of the Order of the Arts and Letters of France (1998)
• Adalid Prize for Freedom awarded by the municipality of La Albuera (Badajoz) on the occasion of the 188th anniversary of the Battle of La Albuera (1999)
• COPE-Cadena 100 Series Award from Vizcaya 2000. King Xavier I of Redonda appoints him Duke of Corso and Royal Master of Tear of the Kingdom of Redonda (1999)
• The New York Times highlights The teacher of fencing as one of the best pocket books of the year (2000)
• Foreign Mediterranean Award 2001 (Paris) The spherical letter
• Medal of the French Marina Academy by The spherical letter (2002)
• Member of the Royal Spanish Academy (2003)
• González-Ruano Prize for Journalism, for the article A window to war (2004)
• Doctor Honoris Causa by the Polytechnic University of Cartagena (2004)
• Distinguished with the V Prize «Joaquín Romero Murube» for the article This long urban day (2004)
• Gran Cruz al Mérito Naval, the highest distinction awarded by the Spanish Navy to a civilian, for his novel Corporal Trafalgar (2005)
• San Telmo Gold Medal of the Letras del Mar Foundation (2006).
• Vallombrosa Gregor von Rezzori Award for The battle painter (2008)
• Knight of the National Order of Merit granted by the French government (2008)
• Grand Prix Littéraire Saint-Emilion Pomerol Fronsac The battle painter (2008)
• Special distinction Army Awards (2008)
• Silver Fiambrera del Ateneo de Córdoba (2009)
• Pedro Antonio de Alarcón National Journalism Award (2013)
• I Premio de Cultura de la Universidad de Sevilla (2013)
• Medal on the merit of the Merchant Navy (2014)
• World Columnists Award (2015)
• King of Spain Prize for Journalism (2017)
• Mariano Award of Cavia (2020)

Predecessor: Manuel Alvar

Academician of the Royal Spanish Academy Chair T 2003-currently

Successor: In office (vital charge)