On the 14th December 2000, Eva Piquer interviewed Francesc Parcerisas for the culture supplement of the paper Avui. One of the questions she asked him was whether, having himself written some criticism he would be prepared to pass judgment on the criticism written in Catalonia at the time. Parcerisas replied:

El crític s'hauria de moure en dos nivells: el de l'apreciació subjectiva i el de la capacitat d'incloure una obra dins un context. Els paràmetres subjectius són un valor, però no poden ser els únics. El crític també ha d'informar i orientar. Trobo a faltar en general a la crítica que es fa aquí una part informativa globalitzadora, on s'expliqui qui és l'autor, què ha fet, per quins canvis ha passat, com ha arribat a fer allò que ara fa... Potser per això es necessita més espai i es necessita un pòsit de lectures que vagin més enllà d'haver llegit una novel·leta. Es fa crítica molt efímera, molt apressada.(1)

Indeed. Parcerisas himself is a good example of this phenomenon. In 1969 Francesc Valverdú had described him as 'l'aportació més important de la jove poesia catalana des de feia molt temps, potser anys' and placed his early lyrical poems with Joan Salvat Papasseit's. However, since then, apart from an article by Carles Miralles in Reduccions in 1984 following the publication of L'edat d'or (1983) and an evaluation of Parcerisas's development leading to the publication of Focs d'octubre (1992) by Jaume Subirana in Serra d'or in 1994, the only substantial academic discussion of his work came not from the Catalan lands but from Britain in Professor Cardwell's article, 'A la recerca de significació: L'edat d'or de Francesc Parcerisas' published in Els Marges in May 1999. There are, on the other hand, a fair number of interviews, some of more substance than others, which I have used as source of information. The rest are no more than brief commentaries in newspapers and magazines.

In this paper, therefore, I shall attempt, within the limits imposed, to give a subjective appreciation of L'edat d'or and to place the work within a wider context explaining one or two things about the poet and evaluating his achievements. This is an ongoing project which I plan to conclude with another paper in which I shall analyse the development that took place between L'edat d'or (1983) and Parcerisas's following collections: Focs d'octubre (1992) and Natura morta amb nens (2000). All quotations have been taken from Parcerisas's Triomf del present, the anthology of all his poetry from 1965 up to and including L'edat d'or, published in 1991.

In spite of the ephemeral nature of the evaluation of Parcerisas's earliest work, comprising the collections Vint poemes civils (1967), Homes que es banyen (1970), Discurs sobre les matèries celestes (1971), Latitud dels cavalls (1974) and Dues suites (1976) there is one thing on which all reviewers seem to have agreed: L'edat d'or is where Parcerisas finds his own voice. As to the value of what he had published prior to that, the judgements cover a wide range. The most negative view comes from Xavier Lloveras (1991) for whom in the early collections there is no more than:

... un mimetisme a ultrança dels diversos moviments que triomfen en cada moment, des del hippisme fins a la poesia engagée, passant per l'avantguardisme més o menys textual que va trencar plats i olles als setanta i el retorn manyac als deliquis romàntics. (2)

This view is balanced out at the other end of the spectrum by Enric Bou's (1994) who thought that:

L'edat d'or (1983) representa un abandonament de l'experimentalisme i el retrobament amb la seva veu fonamental, la que li forneix el discurs líric amb l'incentiu del guany en experiència: vital i literària. Aquest llibre conté alguns dels poemes més remarcables de Parcerisas, bons exemples d'aquesta poesia d'exposició de la vida moral. (3)

Needless to say, when it came to L'edat d'or Lloveras was not impressed. He wrote:

L'últim avatar d'aquesta poesia camaleònica, curiosament, és un revival a deshora - una deshora que triomfa, també, al rellotge aturat de la literatura catalana- de la poesia de l'experiència: una mena de sopar fred on es reuneixen, malalts d'un envelliment prematur, la majoria dels poetes catalans de cinquanta anys cap avall per recordar ocasions perdudes i racons aprofitats. Tot plegat -molta pacotilla de crònica, una magnificació egòlatra de l'experiència personal- s'amaneix amb un treball formal rudimentari, de vegades inexistent, que ens convida, més que res, a tancar el llibre amb una llagrimeta elegíaca.(4)

Here, however, there are two important ideas: firstly, there is an announcement of the poor state of Catalan letters and, secondly, the identification of Parcerisas's work as belonging to a wider type of poetry, poesia de l'experiència, characteristic of that time and highly successful amongst a reading public of whom Lloveras equally disapproves. In spite of Lloveras being an isolated dissenting voice, his comments are important in that they raise doubts on whether the collection would have enjoyed the same acclaim had the historic moment been different and whether the return to its study today is justifiable.

According to Navarro Arisa, in 1993 Parcerisas declared that he didn't initially understand why the book had been such a success both amongst readers and critics:

Em sorprèn que s'hagi ressaltat aquest llibre. De vegades hi ha obres que encerten a sintonitzar amb una època o amb un estat anímic de certes persones. Crec que L'edat d'or és el sediment dels anys 60 i 70 convertits, no en novetat, no en descobriment, sinó en una experiència acceptada i assumida.(5)

Looking at L'edat d'or in context, it is noticeable that its value still today is precisely that it has retained the atmosphere of the Catalonia of those days, warts and all. That was the time for the poètica de combat; a time for social involvement; a time for strong emotions and personal quests. Parcerisas explains:

Jo diria que, a partir d'aquell clima, els joves poetes que havien iniciat un recorregut personal molt típic, amb més lectures de política que de poètica, van començar a veure compensat el desequilibri després del desencisament personal, de les sortides a l'estranger i de l'exploració d'aquells aires de llibertat fraterna, i idealista, que recorregueren les darreries dels anys seixanta (Che, maig 68, Dylan, Beatles,...).[...] El que sí que és cert és que el desencisament, que havia estat un aire generacional dels poetes nats els anys quaranta, en aquest grup serà representat pel delit de treballar i de bastir uns nous esquemes culturals eminentment catalans.(6)

In the group mentioned, Parcerisas was accompanied by Narcís Comadira, Salvador Oliva, Marta Pessarrodona and others, all of whom were suffering the consequences of the poor state of the Catalan language. Parcerisas and some other poets descended from non-Catalan or bilingual families and in the late 60s and early 70s were placed before one of three choices: they either continued writing in Castilian (as did the Goytisolo brothers, Jaime Gil de Biedma, Carlos Barral, Manuel Vázquez Montalbán, Félix de Azúa, etc.); they changed to Catalan (as did Pere Gimferrer, Josep Elias, etc.), or they wrote in Catalan in spite of the lack of means (as had been the case of Gabriel Ferrater and later Narcís Comadira, Francesc Parcerisas, etc.). Those who took the latter option found themselves in a paradoxical situation. First and foremost, Catalan had been excluded from their education. Parcerisas was painfully aware of the limitations against which they were fighting and in 1982 admitted that: ' ....hi ha la pressió primigènia de la manca d'una formació filològica catalana sòlida que feia que jo partís d'un vocabulari elemental o de diccionari.'(7) This, together with the inevitable naivety of the young, can partly account for the prodigious experimentation we find in Parcerisas' early poetry and the progressive settling of his style in later collections. Fortunately for our poet, however, as he got involved first in teaching Catalan in Secondary school and later in the school of Translation at the Universitat Autònoma de Bellaterra, any problems with language were gradually overcome. But that was after L'edat d'or.

On the other hand, in the 60s -like in the Renaixença- language had simultaneously become the axis around which Catalan culture revolved, the keystone of nationalist combat and a particularly useful weapon in the Nova cançó. Indeed, the role of poets was, for a while at least, that of manobres lingüístics and social protesters.

No era tant qüestió de salvació de la llengua, [said Parcerisas] sinó de l'ús que s'havia de fer d'aquesta llengua i de la literatura com a eines dins d'una col·lectivitat que tenia molt clar potser no cap on anava, però sí, com a mínim, que volia moure's.(8)

Perhaps this desire could be interpreted as a natural change for young Catalan poets like Parcerisas and his contemporaries who, even if only mildly in comparison to the UK and the USA, were the first to feel in the flesh the existence and consequences of the generation gap.(9)

This is how language and its use become central to L'edat d'or. Nonetheless, it is difficult to ascertain if the avoidance of a recognisable poetic form or poetic style is a rebellious gesture, typical of the first post-Franco generation, a recognition of Parcerisas's own linguistic inability or a combination of both. When interviewed by Joan Rendé Masdéu in 1982 and asked about this issue he explained:

Jo penso que la poesia té un ritme de lectura, un ritme de lectura en veu alta o en veu baixa. És un ritme diguem-ne subjectiu, que seria més fàcil d'assimilar a un ritme accentual que no a un ritme sil·làbic. Ara, en aquestes coses no hi penso, quan escric, em refio del meu ritme intern i prou.(10)

This explains why Parcerisas devoted less time to the eternal debate between content and form and concentrated, rather, on meta-poetic issues. Besides, in 1988, his comments on the subject let some extra light into his real views on the subject when he admitted that:

Allò que m'interessa és el que diu [el poema], les imatges, si bé a Catalunya hi ha hagut una certa tendència al formalisme. [...] He partit d'un vers lliure i sóc un metrista dolent, de curiositat, potser. No domino la part mètrica. Quan ho provo, no estic a gust.(11)

In keeping with the mood of the time, it would have been justifiable for him to identify with the youth culture and opt for everyday language rather than what was regarded as old-fashioned formalism.

Parcerisas' fascination with abstract concepts seems to go further than his concern about the use of the Catalan language. The poet has to capture the feelings produced by the everyday experiences that stimulate his mind, let them awaken his creative instinct and face up to the challenge of bridging the gulf that exists between them. Overcoming man's limitations in this respect is at best a complicated task; doing so when you are uncertain about the use of your own language has to be even more daunting. We can see this struggle in a number of poems of L'edat d'or, particularly in 'Un dia com aquest' and 'Poètica'.

In 'Un dia com aquest' we find the poet as the protagonist seen through someone else's eyes. It is memory what keeps him alive, even if he feels unsettled. Passion is the creative stimulus and writing a tool which allows him, even if momentarily, to bring his love back to life.(12)

In 'Poètica' a narrative style is used to evoke the life of the poet and the vanishing memory he left behind. The tone is amazingly credible; the description set in such a way that we are impelled to look for a dedication, a name we can relate it to. Desire, the past, loneliness, despair and weakness, alcohol, sex, disjointed bits of writing and treasured books are all used to emphasize the temporality and relativity in the value of this life. The result is painfully vivid and thought-provoking.

Following on from the question raised earlier about the identification with the times and the desire to see the world through contemporary situations, we find ourselves before the paradoxical culturalisme and its coexistence with quotidianitat in L'edat d'or. The literary readings and influences present in this collection are varied, eclectic and disorganized. A few poems which air on the culturalista side with overtones easily associated with the Classics (Virgil, Ovid, Homer, Milton, Baudelaire, Camoes, Góngora...), share their pages with others combining intertextuality with poesia de l'experiència, more easily linked to Parcerisas' modern readings and acquaintances (Kavafis, Graves, Cernuda, Gil de Biedma, Gabriel Ferrater, Joan Ferraté, Vinyoli, Salvat-Papasseit, Carner, Eliot, Auden, McNiece, Olson, Creely, Dickey, the early Ginsberg, Kerouac, Jim Morrison (the electric poet), Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir, Comadira, Pessarrodona, Oliva, Elias, Durrell, Gimferrer, Riba, ...). Adding to these, there are also a variation on one of Lawrence Durrell's poems and three translations.

The impact, duration and nature of the trails left by other writers in Parcerisas' work vary enormously but, if nothing else, one can say that such a wide range of readings should have equipped our poet with enough baggage to develop his own style and draw as much or as little from them as each occasion demanded.

Parcerisas does not deny his incursions into the culturalista minefield. On the contrary, he has stated that writing poetry is, to his view, the most culturalista of actions.(13) But classing L'edat d'or as culturalista would be a mistake. A close reading shows that some poems in the collection are, indeed, openly classical in tone, in subject or in both. However, the poet invariably transports these themes to the realm of his personal experience. This is the case in 'Testes romanes' (a poem influenced by Antonio Colinas in which time and the loss of passionate intensity ridicule the poet's own fascination with antiquity), 'Calipso', 'Ulises', 'L'emperador Adrià medita sobre l'edat d'or' and 'La mà de Virgili'. A complicating factor is that, alongside these, Parcerisas includes two poems by Iannis Ritsos, '"Pedres" and '"La desesperació de Penèlope", which he translated from the English translation by Nikos Stangos and whose themes and tone are incredibly similar to his own, where he simultaneously incorporates a hectic mixture of literary references ranging from Lawrence Durrell to Homer, Dante, Yourcenar, Ritsos and others.

In 'Calipso we find a warm combination of culturalisme and humanity. Here we see how, however fascinating perfection might be, ageing is a natural process for man as is the need for unfulfilled desire and unreachable memory.

In 'Ulises', on the other hand, we find a playful reply to "La desesperació de Penèlope", the poem by Iannis Ritsos that Parcerisas had just translated. The subject is the same as in the original poem but the perspective is the opposite. Instead of Penelope's realization that waiting for Ulises to come back has been a waste of time, here it is Ulises who evaluates the situation when he gets back. This is a classical theme seen through the eyes of a modern man: a warier cannot come back after so many years and expect to find everyone waiting for him or be allowed back without all sorts of questions being asked. Neither can he escape having to answer to the morality of his decisions or address the decisions taken by others in his absence.

In the subjective appraisal in hand, I shall state my preference as for the poemes de l'experiència, some of which, of course, incorporate the cultural elements just mentioned. What is striking is Parcerisas's interest in this type of poetry as seen in his 1979 evaluation of the new poetry of the time 'A l'entorn de la jove poesia al Principat' where, while referring to his lost master Gabriel Ferrater, he wrote:

Els joves camins de l'exploració de l'experiència subjectiva a través d'un correlat objectiu -i, per tant, l'objectivació de l'experiència personal, individual- i l'afirmació i el joc amb les múltiples possibilitats del llenguatge semblen bastant ben establerts.(14)

This was followed in 1984 by Parcerisas's self-definition as a poet of experience and of his work as descriptive, openly elegiac and in harmony with the trends of his time.(15) We find a detailed explanation of his creative process in an interview by Lluís Bonada four years later:

Molts dels meus poemes són cases fetes a partir d'un mateix patró. Hi ha un escenari molt sovint visual que crea una complicitat de connotació cultural amb el lector. Parteixo d'escenes assumibles per qualsevol persona amb facilitat. Quan llegim poemes reconeixem experiències que tots hem viscut personalment o que sabem que existeixen i que se'ns plantegen d'una manera visible per nosaltres en tant que lectors.(16)

Having seen what Parcerisas himself has said and considered the ideas he puts forward, it would be useful to ascertain to what extent his poetry fulfils the criteria set out by Jaume Subirana in 'Parcerisas i la poesia de l'experiència. Cinc notes sobre els últims llibres de Francesc Parcerisas'(1994). According to him, the poetry of experience:

Es construeix sobre la consciència del desequilibri entre experiència i idea: planteja el que planteja no com una idea sinó com una experiència a partir de la qual després podran ser abstractes diferents idees. [...] L'anàlisi de l'experiència que contenen els esdeveniments és producte d'un judici i una comprensió lògics a posteriori, i això implica que els esdeveniments tenen estructura, significat i propòsit propis. [...]L'experiència, en canvi, pren la seva forma del flux de consciència.(17)

We can find these most successfully achieved in poems of L'edat d'or such as 'Triomf del present', 'Matí al bar', 'Comiat' and 'Un dia com aquest'.

In 'Triomf del present' the focus is placed upon the recovery of memory through renewed passion and the possibility of rendering the passing of time powerless through the enjoyment of the present. This is a carpe diem much less desperate than Ferrater's.

In 'Matí al bar' the routine visit allows for the centre stage to taken by the feelings of desire and anticipation underlined by the precariously held distance. This is an exercise in showing the intellectual element of eroticism much in the same vein as Ferrater's and, therefore, Georges Bataille.

These two poems, identifiably influenced by Kavafis in their tone and use of the third person narrative voice, succeed in presenting the reader with a deceptive sense of objectivity. The refinement of his treatment of experience is obviously a pursuit which Parcerisas has carried with him throughout his career and his original fascination and identification with Gabriel Ferrater is still present more than 20 years after his original observations on the subject.(18) However, a comparison of their poetry shows that Parcerisas' tone is quite different, much more content and much less excessive than his master's. In this sense, perhaps the single most important element in making L'edat d'or unique and successful amongst the Catalan reading public of the early 80s was the way in which the poems addressed and shared these personal experiences still managing to maintain a certain level of detachment. The secret to this, which seems to have come directly from Kavafis, is explained by Parcerisas thus:

L'edat d'or és un llibre que fa servir sempre la tercera persona, la qual cosa no passa en els altres llibres, on generalment el que parla és un jo. Com a escriptor sé que la troballa d'aquesta tercera persona va ser un element que em va permetre una distància respecte a allò que jo volia explicar o a allò que volia fer. Ara comprenc que aquest distanciament és una cosa que potser pot atreure al lector, és com una mena d'escenari. I també pot connectar amb el que parlàvem abans de la recepció. Potser el públic està més preparat per rebre aquest tipus de novel·la, de narració, d'intimitat disfressada de tercera persona que no una intimitat del jo en primera persona, que, segurament, avui semblaria massa descarat.(19)

In analysing the kind of experiences at the core of L'edat d'or we find what Enric Bou has named l'accés a la maduresa,(20) with all the acceptance and envy, enjoyment and guilt that go with it. The complexities of such a string of emotions are obvious and the meaning of Parcerisas's golden age sometimes difficult to pin down. In fact, when asked by Antoni Gual and Rosa Soler in 1987 Parcerisas explained that:

L'accent intencionat és en l'acceptació, en els límits voluntaris a l'ambició. Si voleu es pot entendre com una referència a la mediocritat daurada que jo considero com una mena d'estoïcisme, potser una mica orientaloide. Que ningú no hi vegi una resignació de màrtir, no, sinó un acontentar-se amb tot allò bo que la vida ens ofereix...(21)

And the next year, this time interviewed by Lluís Bonada, he qualified the explanation by stating that, in fact, it had two dimensions: one human and one historic. He said:

L'edat d'or humana és l'edat de la reflexió, de la conformació, de l'acceptació d'un mateix. Aquesta acceptació crec que és una edat d'or en la psicologia de l'evolució de cada persona. Saps el que vols, saps quins són els teus límits. Saps que hi ha coses que no podràs fer mai. Acceptes la renúncia.

As for the second, he added:

La històrica és la que hem viscut la gent de la meva edat i d'aquest país. Aquests últims anys el nostre món ha anat molt de pressa. La Barcelona de fa uns anys era del segle XIX. Crec que la nostra posició és privilegiada. Una edat d'or que les generacions futures no tindran l'oportunitat de conèixer. No sabran res de la religió, del camp, de la família. La gent de vint anys, difícilment sap què és una societat rural.(22)

With regard to acceptance, it is interesting to look at the poem 'Afatitat'.

In this poem Parcerisas shows the contradictory feelings of acceptance and denial that coexist in the ageing individual. It also reflects upon the late discovery of intimacy, the progressive loss of youth and the slow acceptance of the inevitable. The poet himself has explained:

"Afaitat" és un del poemes de L'edat d'or en què es veu clarament aquest procés de diàleg amb un mateix, l'alteritat en el mateix individu.[...] És l'observació de la pròpia cara. De fet hi vull expressar que la gent, contra allò que solem pensar, no ens mirem al mirall; no et mires explorant-te, estudiant-te. No solament la cara, sinó el propi cos, és una de les coses més desconegudes que tenim.(23)

In contrast to this, in his very perceptive analysis of L'edat d'or, Carles Miralles points to the element of guilt as a counterbalance to what might have seemed too easy an acceptance, too rosy a middle-life crisis. He writes:

Conèixer-se un mateix comporta necessàriament, ara, sentir-se culpable: d'una manera absoluta, de tot i de res en concret. Aquest sentiment de culpabilitat entela sovint, com una boira, els poemes de Parcerisas: els frega, els sobrevola; deixa indicis de la seva presència pertot. [...] El pes de la memòria és fet de mancances: dies perduts, rostres irrecuperables; absència o mort enllà.(24)

In addition to this, in poems such as 'Variació sobre un poema de Lawrence Durrell', 'Poètica', 'Joventut procaç', 'Colònia d'estiueig', 'Un dia com aquest', 'La ciutat deserta', etc., we find a manifest sense of loss sometimes only lessened by the drowning of the protagonist's sorrows in alcohol ('Colònia' and 'Variació sobre un poema de Lawrence Durrell').

In 'Joventut procaç' we find the brutal realisation of the passing of time in the teacher's observation of the young. There is a mixture of envy and longing; a resigned acceptance. Written in the second person, the voice of the narrator talks to the teacher making him accept what he will not tell himself, almost as if it was his inner voice talking him through important ethic matters. According to Parcerisas in this poem:

Veus la gent jove que t'enlluerna i, al mateix temps, saps que allò mateix que t'enlluerna pot ser, en certa manera, la seva perdició. Això també és enveja; és un poema d'enveja i de les excuses que l'enveja es fabrica per dissimular-se.(25)

Similarly but in a somewhat more nostalgic tone, in 'Colònia d'estiueig' the poet sets off on a journey to his childhood and discovers himself in his memories.

The return to the present is portrayed but necessary but not easy without the help of some escapism provided by alcohol.

Another string of themes which recurrently appear in L'edat d'or are solidarity, civisme (in the sense of public spirit), knowledge and ethics. It is a common mistake, as Jaume Subirana rightly points out, to think of the poetry of experience as something banal and superficial. Contrary to this, we find that the principles and concerns behind Parcerisas's poetry are much more socially committed and ethically based than one would have expected. Like Subirana, I would extend Dolors Oller's view of Ferrater to Parcerisas when she says that the experience in which we share when we read his poems:

... és molt més complexa en el sentit que allò que hi importa no és ni la situació ni el pretext del poema sinó la reflexió moral, molt més general i abstracta, que d'ells es deriva".(26)

Attached to this ethical approach there is a great deal of interest in self knowledge (as earlier seen in 'Afaitat') and in getting to know other individuals. In L'edat d'or there are some moments of criticism of the world in which the poet and his contemporaries live. In an unstable, often hostile world, the poet searches for durable stable principles to sustain him. Sometimes, almost falling into the trap of nostalgia as he tries to recover happiness from the past through memory. In fact, Parcerisas sees memory as a 'part constitutiva de l'ésser'.(27)

What is interesting in Parcerisas's case is his believe in the intrinsic truth of poetry. Thus, in poetry itself he seems to find one of the enduring qualities just mentioned.(28) This set of linked ideas, as stated by Parcerisas himself, develops through a process of interiorization and analysis built around personal and, more often than not, erotic relationships. In this sense, L'edat d'or would fall within the same category as Papers privats, by Comadira, Vida privada, by M. Pessarrodona, Marees del desig, by S. Oliva o Ideari a la recerca de la fruita tendra, by J. Elias which, according to Parcerisas, '... són exemples d'aquest seny inútil que se sap dissolt en la ceguesa de la passió i de l'amarga intel·ligència.'(29) In fact, when asked in an interview by Eva Piquer in 2000 whether life, and therefore literature, was made up by memory and passion, Parcerisas established a clear correlation between the two. He answered:

Segur. Sense memòria no existiríem. Una persona sense memòria no coneixeria la tradició, ni el futur, ni el desig. Dubto que una persona sense memòria es pogués enamorar. L'amor és record i projecció. El desig ens porta a construir en abstracte a partir de la nostra memòria, personal o adquirida. La passió és un dels grans motors de la memòria.(30)

From what we have seen so far it would seem fair to assume that the theme of passion as a means to knowledge is one which Parcerisas inherits from Ferrater rather than from other, more subjectively involved poets he admires, such as Robert Graves or Jaime Gil de Biedma.(31)

Passion, therefore, is a key element in life, but so is memory. In fact, when Parcerisas talks about himself, he does so in very similar terms to those he uses when talking about Ferrater. For him, too, passion and memory will amount to something really deep and directly linked to writing:

... en ocupar-nos de l'amor i de la passió, algú creu que estem fent una enumeració estulta d'aventures ocasionals que per força ens són -i ens eren- indiferents i no una anàlisi de les etapes de la nostra formació essencial com a éssers humans.[...] Fet i fet, aquests dos components de memòria i passió són, tal com jo l'entenc, una de les columnes vertebrals de la vida -i, evidentment, de la literatura-. (32)

Elements of temporality will, therefore, become crucial to his work. The very title of his collected poems, Triomf del present (a verse from a poem in L'edat d'or), attests to that. According to the poet:

Té el sentit de veure cada moment com un moment fins a cert punt aïllat i ple, per això el triomf del present: no veure tots aquests anys de poesia com una cosa perduda, morta, sinó com una suma de moments cadascun dels quals en la seva circumstància van ser vistos com una plenitud. I el que en queda ara són una sèrie de presents, més que no pas una etapa, o un passat.(33)

This way we can detect a variation on the previously mentioned line of thought running through many of the poems in the collection. This time it links the present, passion, memory and the future. These are important values to Parcerisas, which sometimes can be misunderstood. He states:

El record és l'eina més poderosa que tenim d'exploració del passat en el sentit que, si tot és present, la suma dels presents constitueix el passat, i com que el futur no existeix, és una entelèquia, l'única cosa de la qual podem parlar és del present. De fet, el record és allò que som, allò que hem arribat a ser perquè ens hem fet d'una determinada manera. El record ens obre les portes amb la capacitat de fer presents, de donar vida als moments bons del passat. (34)

However, one can't live in the past. This would go against the same acceptance that he also defends and the only way out for the poets is the adoption of a pro-active attitude.

... si tu apostes pel present [he says], el teu passat serà d'acord amb això que has fet. Fins i tot quan una cosa et surt malament, quan has perdut una jugada molt important, el fet que hagis estat capaç de tirar endavant és una cosa que sempre t'acompanyarà. És una actitud a favor d'un cert valor i no de la covardia; el covard s'ha de penedir de no fer i, posats a penedir-se, millor que sigui d'actuar --sempre amb els límits ètics que calgui, és clar!(35)

After analysing the poems of L'edat d'or and looked at the language, the political climate in Catalunya and the contact with everyday reality in the rest of Spain, Europe and the USA either through direct experience or through reading, I would conclude that these were the factors that permeated L'edat d'or and gave it its loose, youthful and mildly irreverent tone thus producing a clear contrast with the more volatile and self-conscious style of Parcerisas' early collections. The poet's deepening relationship with both life and literature led him to a poetry which, although not ground-breaking, found pleasant resonance in the heart and intellect of many young Catalans in those difficult years of the transition to Democracy and its lasting quality resides precisely in its ability to bring back to life in every reading the peculiar atmosphere of a poet's life in Barcelona back in the late 1970s and early 1980s.