Barcelona. A history

«The majority of the houses of Barcelona are attractive, and in this it may even surpass Florence.» FRANCESCO GUICCIARDINI, Florentine ambassador, 1511. «Passing through de formidable, immense fortifications of Barcelona, with an abundance of gateways, drawbridges, posterns and bastions, everything announces a city in arms.» GEORGE SAND, French novelist, 1838. «In Barcelona I have experienced wonderful things.» GEORGE ORWELL, English writer, 1937. «Since the Olympic Games of 1992, Barcelona has become the stage of the city of dreams.» MARIA-THERESE HOPPE, anthropologist of the Copenhaguen Institute for Future Studies, 2000. JOAN CASTELLAR-GASSOL is the autor of Gaudí: The life of a visionary and other books of historical dissemination.