Roaming the Streets of Barcelona – The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafón

Whenever I visit a city, I bring a book that takes place there. I don’t quite know why. Do I bring it because I want to look clever? Do I bring it because I want to be inspired? Do I bring it because I want to follow in the footstep of the main characters? I think it’s a bit of everything. So when I visited Barcelona last week, I made sure to bring Carlos Ruiz Zafón’s novel The Shadow of the Wind, which fully takes place there. Want to know whether I found out the true reason to bring specific books on city trips? Read on!

The Shadow of the Wind is about Daniel, who grows up in post-Second World War Barcelona. When he is ten years old, his father brings him to the so-called Cemetery of Forgotten Books (the name is quite self-explanatory), he picks up the novel The Shadow of the Wind by Julián Carax. It turns out this books and its author are clouded in mystery, and some people seem determined to destroy it, making Daniel all the more convinced that he should uncover its secrets and preserve the book forever.

Usually I bring at least three books on a city trip; I often finish the first one during the trip there, then I start the other, and the third one was brought as a back-up anyway. Also, I always make sure to visit plenty of bookshops, ending up with more books than I arrived with. This time I only brought Ruiz Zafón’s novel. Since it was my first time in Barcelona, I decided I’d be busier exploring the city than reading a novel set in it. Turns out I was right; I am not even halfway through it.

Despite not reading much, I carried the novel around everywhere we went. I always do this when I visit a foreign city, because it allows me to pretend to be more part of a novel than I usually do, and it makes me feel like I know the city intimately. Somehow reading about a city in a novel makes it more real to me, even though the characters in it aren’t real. This happened when I was reading The Shadow of the Wind, too; I recognized descriptions of La Rambla and the Gothic Quarter in the novel, and I smiled to myself whenever we visited a place I had just read about.

After a while, however, I had a sudden epiphany. Had I already visited the city because I had read the novel? Or did I understand the book better because I had seen it in real life? I realised I was not visiting the same Barcelona that is described so vividly in the novel that it almost becomes a character in itself. In fact, I think I visited at least three different Barcelonas, namely Daniel’s changing city in the novel (which takes place from 1945 to 1956 and therefore describes a slightly different city with each year that passes), the Barcelona that Ruiz Zafón knows and penned down, and the one that I physically walked around in. But which one was the real one?

Nothing is ever truly objective. For instance, the first time I read The Shadow of the Wind was ages ago, when I didn’t know anything about literature, history, Barcelona, or even love, but I enjoyed the mystery and intrigue, and I understood the protagonist’s love for books. Last week I loved its style and its clever plot, but was bothered by the way the main characters (all of whom men) described women only by their looks. I also paid special attention to descriptions of the city. Furthermore, I kept wondering whether Ruiz Zafón painted his Barcelona true to life, or changed a few things here or there because it would add to the atmosphere of the novel.

I must have visited all three Barcelonas last week. I read about it, I thought about the city described in the novel, and I walked around in it, looking at the city with my own eyes. Was my experience my own, or was it influenced by the novel I read? Or did my friend make me see the city in a different way, too? Does that mean the next time I’m in Barcelona, with someone else, I visit yet another Barcelona? Also, do I need pictures in order to remember it? Or do I just need a novel set in it in order to be transported back to it?

I think I just need to visit it again if I want an answer to all those questions.

What did you think of The Shadow of the Wind? Have you ever been to Barcelona? If so, what did you think of it? What kind of traveller are you? Which book about a city is your favourite? Do you think reading a book about a city improves the experience of being there? Please let me know in the comments! Also, don’t forget to follow me for more book-related posts!