Fernando Arrabal Terán (born August 11, 1932 in Melilla

Melilla

Melilla is a autonomous city of Spain and an exclave on the north coast of Morocco. Melilla, along with the Spanish exclave Ceuta, is one of the two Spanish territories located in mainland Africa...

, Spain

Spain

Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...

) is a Spanish

Spanish people

The Spanish are citizens of the Kingdom of Spain. Within Spain, there are also a number of vigorous nationalisms and regionalisms, reflecting the country's complex history....

 playwright

Playwright

A playwright, also called a dramatist, is a person who writes plays.The term is not a variant spelling of "playwrite", but something quite distinct: the word wright is an archaic English term for a craftsman or builder...

, screenwriter

Screenwriter

Screenwriters or scriptwriters or scenario writers are people who write/create the short or feature-length screenplays from which mass media such as films, television programs, Comics or video games are based.-Profession:...

, film director

Film director

A film director is a person who directs the actors and film crew in filmmaking. They control a film's artistic and dramatic nathan roach, while guiding the technical crew and actors.-Responsibilities:...

, novelist and poet

Poet

A poet is a person who writes poetry. A poet's work can be literal, meaning that his work is derived from a specific event, or metaphorical, meaning that his work can take on many meanings and forms. Poets have existed since antiquity, in nearly all languages, and have produced works that vary...

. He settled in France in 1955, he describes himself as “desterrado,” or “half-expatriate, half-exiled.”

Arrabal has directed seven full-length feature films; he has published over 100 plays, 14 novels, 800 poetry collections, chapbooks, and artist’s books; several essays, and his notorious “Letter to General Franco” during the dictator’s lifetime. His complete plays have been published in a number of languages, in a two-volume edition totaling over two thousand pages. The New York Times theatre critic Mel Gussow

Mel Gussow

Melvyn H. Gussow was an American theater critic, movie critic, and author who wrote for The New York Times for 35 years.-Biography:...

 has called Arrabal the last survivor among the “three avatars of modernism.”

In 1962 Arrabal co-founded the Panic Movement

Panic Movement

Panic Movement was a collective formed by Fernando Arrabal, Alejandro Jodorowsky and Roland Topor in Paris, France in 1962...

 with Alejandro Jodorowsky

Alejandro Jodorowsky

Alejandro Jodorowsky Prullansky, known as Alejandro Jodorowsky, is a Chilean filmmaker, playwright, actor, author, comic book writer and spiritual guru...

 and Roland Topor

Roland Topor

Roland Topor , was a French illustrator, painter, writer and filmmaker, known for the surreal nature of his work...

, inspired by the god Pan

Pan (mythology)

Pan , in Greek religion and mythology, is the god of the wild, shepherds and flocks, nature, of mountain wilds, hunting and rustic music, as well as the companion of the nymphs. His name originates within the Greek language, from the word paein , meaning "to pasture." He has the hindquarters, legs,...

, and was elected Transcendent Satrap of the Collège de Pataphysique in 1990. Forty other Transcendent Satraps have been elected over the past half-century, including Marcel Duchamp

Marcel Duchamp

Marcel Duchamp was a French artist whose work is most often associated with the Dadaist and Surrealist movements. Considered by some to be one of the most important artists of the 20th century, Duchamp's output influenced the development of post-World War I Western art...

, Eugène Ionesco

Eugène Ionesco

Eugène Ionesco was a Romanian and French playwright and dramatist, and one of the foremost playwrights of the Theatre of the Absurd...

, Man Ray

Man Ray

Man Ray , born Emmanuel Radnitzky, was an American artist who spent most of his career in Paris, France. Perhaps best described simply as a modernist, he was a significant contributor to both the Dada and Surrealist movements, although his ties to each were informal...

, Boris Vian

Boris Vian

Boris Vian was a French polymath: writer, poet, musician, singer, translator, critic, actor, inventor and engineer. He is best remembered today for his novels. Those published under the pseudonym Vernon Sullivan were bizarre parodies of criminal fiction, highly controversial at the time of their...

, Dario Fo

Dario Fo

Dario Fo is an Italian satirist, playwright, theater director, actor and composer. His dramatic work employs comedic methods of the ancient Italian commedia dell'arte, a theatrical style popular with the working classes. He currently owns and operates a theatre company with his wife, actress...

, Umberto Eco

Umberto Eco

Umberto Eco Knight Grand Cross is an Italian semiotician, essayist, philosopher, literary critic, and novelist, best known for his novel The Name of the Rose , an intellectual mystery combining semiotics in fiction, biblical analysis, medieval studies and literary theory...

 and Jean Baudrillard

Jean Baudrillard

Jean Baudrillard was a French sociologist, philosopher, cultural theorist, political commentator, and photographer. His work is frequently associated with postmodernism and post-structuralism.-Life:...

.

A friend of Andy Warhol

Andy Warhol

Andrew Warhola , known as Andy Warhol, was an American painter, printmaker, and filmmaker who was a leading figure in the visual art movement known as pop art...

 and Tristan Tzara

Tristan Tzara

Tristan Tzara was a Romanian and French avant-garde poet, essayist and performance artist. Also active as a journalist, playwright, literary and art critic, composer and film director, he was known best for being one of the founders and central figures of the anti-establishment Dada movement...

, Arrabal spent three years as a member of André Breton

André Breton

André Breton was a French writer and poet. He is known best as the founder of Surrealism. His writings include the first Surrealist Manifesto of 1924, in which he defined surrealism as "pure psychic automatism"....

’s surrealist group.

‘’Arrabal’s theatre is a wild, brutal, cacophonous, and joyously provocative world. It is a dramatic carnival in which the carcass of our “advanced” civilizations is barbecued over the spits of a permanent revolution. He is the artistic heir of Kafka

Franz Kafka

Franz Kafka was a culturally influential German-language author of short stories and novels. Contemporary critics and academics, including Vladimir Nabokov, regard Kafka as one of the best writers of the 20th century...

’s lucidity and Jarry’s humor; in his violence, Arrabal is related to Sade

Marquis de Sade

Donatien Alphonse François, Marquis de Sade was a French aristocrat, revolutionary politician, philosopher, and writer famous for his libertine sexuality and lifestyle...

 and Artaud. Yet he is doubtless the only writer to have pushed derision as far as he did. Deeply political and merrily playful, both revolutionary and bohemian, his work is the syndrome of our century of barbed wire and Gulags, a manner of finding a reprieve.’’

The Dictionary of Literatures in the French Language (Dictionnaire des littératures de langue française; Editions Bordas.)

Childhood (1932–1946)

Fernando Arrabal (Terán is his second family name) is son of the painter Fernando Arrabal Ruiz and Carmen Terán González. On July 17, 1936, when insurrections within the military were staged against the constitutional government of the five-year-old Second Spanish Republic, launching the Spanish Civil War, Fernando Arrabal’s father remained faithful to the Republic. As a result, he was sentenced to death for mutiny. His sentence was later commuted to thirty years’ imprisonment. Fernando Arrabal Senior was transferred between prisons, from Santi Espiritu in Melilla to Monte Hacho in Ceuta, where he attempted suicide, as well as Ciudad Rodrigo and Burgos. Finally, on December 4, 1941, he was sent to the Burgos Hospital, on the pretext of being mentally ill. Later research has implied that he feigned psychological illness in order to be transferred to a lower security prison. On December 29, 1941, Fernando Arrabal Senior escaped from the hospital in his pyjamas, despite three feet of snow covering the countryside. He was never seen again, despite extensive researches carried out years later.

His son Fernando Arrabal has written: “Without trying to compare what is incomparable, when I confront these twilight episodes (and quite often without any logical connection), I often think of that scapegoat, my father. The day on which the Uncivil War began, he was locked up by his “compassionate companions” in the flag room of the Melilla military barracks. He was meant to think carefully, since he risked a death sentence for mutiny if he did not join them in their insurrection (alzamiento). After an hour, Lieutenant Fernando Arrabal summoned his ex-comrades – already! – to inform them that he had pondered long enough. Today, because of this precedent, must I serve as witness, example, or symbol, as he did, of the most fundamental occurrences? I, who am a mere exile. If I am taken away from my beloved numerics, everything around me leads to over-the-counter confusion and disorder. I have no wish to be a scapegoat like my father, I only ask to die while still living, whenever Pan so wishes.”

Meanwhile, in 1936, Arrabal’s mother returned to Ciudad Rodrigo with little Fernando, and soon found a job at Burgos, then the capitol of the Nationalists and headquarters of General Franco’s government. In 1937 Fernando was enrolled in a local Catholic school until 1940, when after the end of the Civil War, his mother moved again, to Madrid.

In 1941, Fernando Arrabal was awarded the national prize for gifted children. He continued his studies at Las Escuelas Pías de San Antón, a church school whose distinguished pupils over the years also included Victor Hugo and Jacinto Benavente y Martínez. Later Arrabal also studied at another distinguished Madrid establishment, Colegio Padres Escolapios De Getafe. An avid reader, young Arrabal was also eager to experience life.

Youth (1946-1956)

In 1947, when his mother ordered him to attend preparatory classes for entrance to the Academia General Militar, Arrabal reacted by playing hooky. As a result, in 1949 he was sent to Tolosa (Guipuzcoa) where he studied business at the Escuela Teórico-Práctica de la Industria y el Comercio del Papel. By 1950, he began to write several plays which have remained unpublished.

In 1951 began work in the paper industry at la Papelera Española. He moved to Valencia where he passed his bachillerato, the first non-compulsory educational option in Spain for those wishing to go on to university. He later moved to Madrid, where he began legal studies. During these years he frequented the venerable cultural institution Ateneo de Madrid as well as poets from the Postismo school, while polishing his early play “Picnic” (then titled “The Soldiers”) and wrote “El triciclo” ( at first titled “Men With a Tricycle.”).

In 1954 he hitchhiked to Paris in order to attend a performance of Brecht’s “Mutter Courage und ihre Kinder” given by the touring Berliner Ensemble. in Madrid later that year he would meet Luce Moreau, who became his wife. In 1955 he was awarded a three months’ scholarship to study in Paris, during which time he lived at the Colegio de España at the Cité Universitaire. At this time he suffered a serious relapse of tuberculosis. He always considered this ailment as a “lucky mishap” which allowed him to move permanently to his “veritable homeland, that of Kundera and Vives, Saint Ignatius of Loyola and Picasso: exile.”

Politics

Arrabal is often considered as anti-franquist and anti-communist, instead expressing an anarchist

Anarchism

Anarchism is generally defined as the political philosophy which holds the state to be undesirable, unnecessary, and harmful, or alternatively as opposing authority in the conduct of human relations...

 trend in cultural production. Actually, he appeared to be in good relationship with the Spanish Communist Party during his exile. A breaking off seems to have occurred in 1977 for reasons close to his professional activity. In particular, a conflict concerning the performance of his play The Architect and the Emperor of Assyria in Barcelona, involving artists reputed to be close to the Communist Party, seems to have been at the origin of the rupture.

Prizes

Premier Prix International Théâtre du Millénaire (2010)

• Although he is one of the most controversial writers of his time, Arrabal’s work has been recognized throughout the world, with honors including the Grand Prize for Theatre of the Académie Française
  Académie française
  L'Académie française , also called the French Academy, is the pre-eminent French learned body on matters pertaining to the French language. The Académie was officially established in 1635 by Cardinal Richelieu, the chief minister to King Louis XIII. Suppressed in 1793 during the French Revolution,...
  
  , the Premio Mariano de Cavia for journalism, the Nabokov Prize for novel writing, the Espasa Prize for Essay Writing, the World Theater Prize, etc.

In 2001, he was runner-up for the Premio Cervantes, nominated by Nobel Prize in Literature

Nobel Prize in Literature

Since 1901, the Nobel Prize in Literature has been awarded annually to an author from any country who has, in the words from the will of Alfred Nobel, produced "in the field of literature the most outstanding work in an ideal direction"...

 Camilo José Cela

Camilo José Cela

Camilo José Cela y Trulock, 1st Marquis of Iria Flavia was a Spanish novelist and short story writer. He was awarded the 1989 Nobel Prize in Literature "for a rich and intensive prose, which with restrained compassion forms a challenging vision of man's vulnerability".-Biography:Cela published his...

 and José Hierro. He was reportedly a finalist for the Nobel Prize in 2005, a prize which several institutions and personalities solicited for him. On July 14, 2005, he was named to France’s Légion d'honneur. In 2007 he was awarded a doctorate of letters Honoris Causa by the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece.
Among his other honors include:

2008

• • “Hijo adoptivo de Ciudad Rodrigo” (España).
  • "Ciudadano de honor" Erlanger (Alemania)
  • "Fronteira do Pensamento" con Bob Wilson, Wim Wenders, Philip Glass y Bernard Henri Levy. Porto Alegre (Brasil).

2007

• • Prix Spinoza (Festival Teranova)
  • Doctor Honoris Causa. Thessalonique (Grèce)
  • Max de Honor, Teatro (Espagne)
  • Prix Pasolini, cinéma (París)

2006

• • Gran Prix d’Interprétation (Festival de Quend, film : « Avida »)
  • Citoyen d’honneur de Spa (Belgique).
  • Clés de la ville de Fontenay (France)

• 2005:
  • Arrabal was decorated with the French Legion of Honor on July 14, 2005.
  • Checa Association of Film Directors Prize. René Char
    René Char
    René Char was a 20th century French poet.-Biography:Char was born in L'Isle-sur-la-Sorgue in the Vaucluse department of France, the youngest of four children of Emile Char and Marie-Therese Rouget, where his father was mayor and managing director of the Vaucluse plasterworks...
    
     Gold Medal, Avignon Festival.
• 2004
  • First Panic Award, International Book Fair (Brussels)
  • Francisco de Vitoria Prize (Puerto Rico)
  • Wittgenstein Prize (University of Murcia
    University of Murcia
    The University of Murcia is the main university in Murcia, Spain. With 38,000 students, it is the largest university in the Región de Murcia.-History:...
    
    )
• 2003
  • National Literary Award
    Premio Nacional de Literatura
    A number of countries offer a National Prize for Literature :* National Prize for Literature * National Prize for Literature * National Prize for Literature...
    
     (Spain)
  • Gold Medal of San Fando (Buenos Aires)
• 2002: Gold Medal of the City of Avignon
• National Theatre Award 2001 (Spain)
• 2000: National Literary Prize (Spain)
• 1999: Alessandro Manzoni Poetry Prize (Italy)
• 1998: Prize of the Society of Authors (France)
• 1995: Officer of Arts and Letters (France)
• 1993: Theatre Prize of the Académie Française
• Since 1990, Arrabal has held the honorary title of "Transcendent Satrape" in the College of ’Pataphysics (Collège de ’Pataphysique). This group, founded in 1948 in homage to the French author Alfred Jarry
  Alfred Jarry
  Alfred Jarry was a French writer born in Laval, Mayenne, France, not far from the border of Brittany; he was of Breton descent on his mother's side....
  
   (1873–1907) has named previous Transcendent Satrapes (“transcendents satrapes”) such as Camilo José Cela
  Camilo José Cela
  Camilo José Cela y Trulock, 1st Marquis of Iria Flavia was a Spanish novelist and short story writer. He was awarded the 1989 Nobel Prize in Literature "for a rich and intensive prose, which with restrained compassion forms a challenging vision of man's vulnerability".-Biography:Cela published his...
  
  , René Clair
  René Clair
  René Clair born René-Lucien Chomette, was a French filmmaker.-Biography:He was born in Paris and grew up in the Les Halles quarter. He attended the Lycée Montaigne and the Lycée Louis-le-Grand. During World War I, he served as an ambulance driver. After the war, he started a career as a journalist...
  
  , Jean Dubuffet
  Jean Dubuffet
  Jean Philippe Arthur Dubuffet was a French painter and sculptor. His idealistic approach to aesthetics embraced so called "low art" and eschewed traditional standards of beauty in favor of what he believed to be a more authentic and humanistic approach to image-making.-Life and work:Dubuffet was...
  
  , Marcel Duchamp
  Marcel Duchamp
  Marcel Duchamp was a French artist whose work is most often associated with the Dadaist and Surrealist movements. Considered by some to be one of the most important artists of the 20th century, Duchamp's output influenced the development of post-World War I Western art...
  
  , Max Ernst
  Max Ernst
  Max Ernst was a German painter, sculptor, graphic artist, and poet. A prolific artist, Ernst was one of the primary pioneers of the Dada movement and Surrealism.-Early life:...
  
  , M. C. Escher
  M. C. Escher
  Maurits Cornelis Escher , usually referred to as M. C. Escher , was a Dutch graphic artist. He is known for his often mathematically inspired woodcuts, lithographs, and mezzotints...
  
  , Eugène Ionesco
  Eugène Ionesco
  Eugène Ionesco was a Romanian and French playwright and dramatist, and one of the foremost playwrights of the Theatre of the Absurd...
  
  , Michel Leiris
  Michel Leiris
  Julien Michel Leiris was a French surrealist writer and ethnographer.-Biography:...
  
  , Man Ray
  Man Ray
  Man Ray , born Emmanuel Radnitzky, was an American artist who spent most of his career in Paris, France. Perhaps best described simply as a modernist, he was a significant contributor to both the Dada and Surrealist movements, although his ties to each were informal...
  
  , The Marx Brothers
  Marx Brothers
  The Marx Brothers were an American family comedy act, originally from New York City, that enjoyed success in Vaudeville, Broadway, and motion pictures from the early 1900s to around 1950...
  
  , Joan Miró
  Joan Miró
  Joan Miró i Ferrà was a Spanish Catalan painter, sculptor, and ceramicist born in Barcelona.Earning international acclaim, his work has been interpreted as Surrealism, a sandbox for the subconscious mind, a re-creation of the childlike, and a manifestation of Catalan pride...
  
  , Jacques Prévert
  Jacques Prévert
  Jacques Prévert was a French poet and screenwriter. His poems became and remain very popular in the French-speaking world, particularly in schools. Some of the movies he wrote are extremely well regarded, with Les Enfants du Paradis considered one of the greatest films of all time.-Life and...
  
  , Raymond Queneau
  Raymond Queneau
  Raymond Queneau was a French poet and novelist and the co-founder of Ouvroir de littérature potentielle .-Biography:Born in Le Havre, Seine-Maritime, Queneau was the only child of Auguste Queneau and Joséphine Mignot...
  
  , and Boris Vian
  Boris Vian
  Boris Vian was a French polymath: writer, poet, musician, singer, translator, critic, actor, inventor and engineer. He is best remembered today for his novels. Those published under the pseudonym Vernon Sullivan were bizarre parodies of criminal fiction, highly controversial at the time of their...
  
  . After Arrabal received this honor, other Transcendent Satrapes have been named, including Roland Topor
  Roland Topor
  Roland Topor , was a French illustrator, painter, writer and filmmaker, known for the surreal nature of his work...
  
  , Umberto Eco
  Umberto Eco
  Umberto Eco Knight Grand Cross is an Italian semiotician, essayist, philosopher, literary critic, and novelist, best known for his novel The Name of the Rose , an intellectual mystery combining semiotics in fiction, biblical analysis, medieval studies and literary theory...
  
  , and Dario Fo
  Dario Fo
  Dario Fo is an Italian satirist, playwright, theater director, actor and composer. His dramatic work employs comedic methods of the ancient Italian commedia dell'arte, a theatrical style popular with the working classes. He currently owns and operates a theatre company with his wife, actress...
  
  .
• 1986: Fine Arts Gold Medal of the Ministry of Culture (Spain)
• 1983: Chevalier of Arts and Letters (France)
• In 1982 Arrabal received the Nadal Prize, for "La torre herida por el rayo"
• 1976: Obie Award
  Obie Award
  The Obie Awards or Off-Broadway Theater Awards are annual awards given by The Village Voice newspaper to theatre artists and groups in New York City...
  
   for Theater (New York)
• 1965 Lugné-Poë Theatre Prize (France).
• 1959: Ford Foundation Award with Italo Calvino
  Italo Calvino
  Italo Calvino was an Italian journalist and writer of short stories and novels. His best known works include the Our Ancestors trilogy , the Cosmicomics collection of short stories , and the novels Invisible Cities and If on a winter's night a traveler .Lionised in Britain and the United States,...
  
  , Hugo Claus
  Hugo Claus
  Hugo Maurice Julien Claus was a leading Belgian author who published under his own name as well as various pseudonyms. Claus' literary contributions spanned the genres of drama, the novel, and poetry; he also left a legacy as a painter and film director...
  
  , Charles Tomlinson
  Charles Tomlinson
  Alfred Charles Tomlinson, CBE is a British poet and translator, and also an academic and artist. He was born and raised in Penkhull in the city of Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire.-Life:...
  
  , Günter Grass
  Günter Grass
  Günter Wilhelm Grass is a Nobel Prize-winning German author, poet, playwright, sculptor and artist.He was born in the Free City of Danzig...
  
   and Robert Pinget
  Robert Pinget
  Robert Pinget was a major avant-garde French writer, born in Switzerland, who wrote several novels and other prose pieces that drew comparison to Beckett and other major Modernist writers...
  
   (New York).

Films

• 1970 Viva la muerte; A co-production of Isabel-Films (Paris) and S.A.T.P.E.C. (Tunis), starring Nuria Espert, Ivan Henriques, and Anouk Ferjac.
• 1972 J'irai comme un cheval fou, (I Will Walk Like a Crazy Horse); produced by the Société Générale de Production – Babylone Films, starring Emmanuelle Riva, Hachemi Marzouk, and Clark Shannon.
• 1975 L'arbre de Guernica, (The Guernica Tree); produced by C.V.C. Communication, Federico Mueller, and Harry N. Blum; starring Maria Angela Melato and Ron Faber.
• 1980 L'odyssée de la Pacific (Pacific Odyssey), produced by Babylone Films, starring Mickey Rooney and Monique Leclerc.
• 1981 Le cimetière des voitures (The Automobile Graveyard), a co-production of Antenne 2 and Babylone Films, starring Alain Bashung and Juliette Berto.
• 1992 Adieu, Babylone! (Farewell, Babylon!) a production of Antenne 2-Cinecim, starring Lélia Fischer and Spike Lee.
• 1998 Jorge Luis Borges: Una vida de poesía, (Borges, a Life in Poetry) a production of Alphaville/Spirali (Italy), starring Lélia Fischer and Alessandro Atti.

In 2005 a 3-DVD box set of Arrabal’s most renowned films was released by Cult Epics including Viva la muerte, I Will Walk Like a Crazy Horse, and The Guernica Tree.
Fernando Arrabal (who has been awarded the Premio Pier Paolo Pasolini for his contributions to cinema) has written and directed seven feature-length films (released on DVD by Cult Epics and Wanda Films).

Several of Fernando Arrabal’s plays have been adapted for the screen, including Le Grand Cérémonial (directed by Pierre-Alain Jolivet); El triciclo (directed by Luis Argueta); El ladrón de sueños (directed by Arroyo), Pique-nique (directed by Louis Sénéchal), Guernica (directed by Peter Lilienthal), Fando et Lis (directed by Alejandro Jodorowsky), etc.

• “‘Viva la muerte’ is an absolute masterpiece, one of the most astonishing I have seen in my lifetime” (André Pieyre de Mandiargues); “Arrabal is ferociously original” (John Parrack, “Rolling Stone”); “An audacious, paroxistic, and artistically successful work” (Amos Vogel, “Village Voice”); “I prefer Arrabal to Fellini or Ingmar Bergman... he is to cinema what Rimbaud is to poetry.” (Raymond-Léopold Bruckberger, “Le Monde”).

Short films

• 1978 Sang et or (Blood and Gold), an Antenne 2 production, starring Edgar Rock and Joshua Watsky.
• 1990 Échecs et Mythe (Chess and Myth), an Antenne 2 production, starring Joël Lautier, Roland Topor, Julie Delpy, and Gabriel Matzneff.
• 1991 New York. New York!, an Antenne 2 production, starring Tom O'Horgan, Melvin Van Peebles, and Tom Bishop.

Operas

On February 13, 2009 Arrabal’s opera “Faustbal,” to music by Leonardo Balada will have its world premiere at the Teatro Real de Madrid, staged by the Comediants of Barcelona. Arrabal explains: “Faustbal is a woman who, in the third millennium, is the reincarnation of Alfred Jarry’s Doctor Faustroll, a new doctor Faust who asks God and Lucifer for words and prayers so that love and charity might be unified. Nothing can satisfy the hurricane of her scientific curiosity, nor calm the storms of her desires. A genius, very beautiful, and enriched by her transports and transfigurations, she vows a torrid love for her Amazon. She leaps between galaxies while the war to end all civilization rages, and moves through space at supersonic speed. Confronting her, Margarito, supreme leader of the armed forces, dons the armor of brutal, electronic repression. He is madly in love with Faustbal under the sky’s cupola. He tries to possess her through the torrent of his tower, employing the services of Mephistopheles himself. Jesús López Cobos, music director of the Teatro Real de Madrid, will conduct the world premiere, which will be sung by sopranos Ana Ibarra and María Rodríguez. The mezzo-soprano Cecilia Diaz will sing the role of the Amazon, while tenors Gerhard Siegel and Eduardo Santamaría will be the two Margaritos, bass Stefano Palatchi

Stefano Palatchi

Stefano Palatchi is a Spanish opera singer who has sung leading bass roles in both Spain and internationally where he is known for his stage skills, timbre and expressive singing...

 will perform the role of God, and baritones Tomas Tomasson and Lauri Vasar will be Mephistopheles.”

Four other operas with librettos by Arrabal have been staged, and the author describes them as “always having been as complex, yet suffering from as few complexes, as did Faustroll.” They are as follows:

• Apokaliptica, with music by Milko Kelemen.
• L’opéra de la Bastille, with music by Marcel Landowski
  Marcel Landowski
  Marcel François Paul Landowski was a French composer, biographer and arts administrator.Born at Pont-l'Abbé, Finistère, Brittany, he was the son of French sculptor Paul Landowski and great-grandson of the composer Henri Vieuxtemps.As an infant he showed early musical promise, and studied piano...
  
  .
• Picknick im Felde, with music by Constantinos Stylianou
• Guernica, with music by Ostfiend Busing.

In October 1985, Arrabal made his debut as an opera stage director at the Opéra Royal de Belgique, where he directed Falla’s “La vida breve” and Granados’s “Goyescas.” “Of course,” Arrabal comments, “under my direction the onstage chorus was nude, or to be more precise, panically covered with clay.”

In 1994 Chamber Made Opera produced the opera 'The Two Executioners'. Libretto by Douglas Horton and Music by David Chesworth. It ran for two seasons in Melbourne Australia 1994 and 1996 at the Matlhouse Theatre. "Easily the most impressive and memorable piece of music theatre in 1994..." The Independent Monthly. Australia.

Novels

• Baal Babylone (1959) (Baal Babylon, ed. Grove Press, New York, 1960; ed. Luchterhand, Berlin, 1960; ed. Lerici, Milan, 1960; Ed. De Bezige Bij
  De Bezige Bij
  De Bezige Bij is one of the most important literary publishing companies in the Netherlands.-History:The company was founded illegally in 1943, during the German occupation of the Netherlands by Geert Lubberhuizen; its fist publication was a poem by Jan Campert called De Achttien Dooden , which...
  
  , Amsterdam, 1972).
• L'enterrement de la sardine, ed. Julliard, 1961 (The Burial of the Sardine
  The Burial of the Sardine
  The Burial of the Sardine is an oil-on-panel painting by Spanish artist Francisco Goya, usually dated to the 1810s. The title is posthumous, referring to the culminating event of a three-day carnival in Madrid ending on Ash Wednesday...
  
  , ed. Calder and Boyars, London, 1966; El entierro de la sardina, Barcelona, Destino, 1984).
• Fêtes et rites de la confusion, ed. Alfaguara, Madrid, Barcelona, 1966. (Riten und Feste der Konfusion, ed. Joseph Melzer, Stuttgart, 1969).
• La Tour prends garde, ed. Grasset, Paris 1983. (La torre herida por el rayo, Barcelona, Destino, 1983; Destino libro, 1984; Círculo de Lectores, 1984; A Torre ferida pelo Raio, ed. Inquirito, Lisboa, 1982; Hohe Türme trifft der Blitz, ed. Kiepenheuer & Witsch, Colonia, 1986; The Tower Struck by Lightning, ed. Viking, New York, 1988).
• La Reverdie
  La Reverdie
  La Reverdie is an Italian group performing polyphonic medieval and Renaissance music.-Group members:* Elisabetta de Mircovich - vocal, vielle* Claudia Caffagni - vocal, lute, psaltery* Livia Caffagni - vocal, flute, vielle...
  
  , ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris, 1985.
• La vierge rouge, ed. Acropole, Paris, 1986 (La virgen roja, Barcelona, Seix Barral, 1987; A Virgen Vermelha, ed. Dom Quixote, Lisboa, 1987; A Virgen Vermelha, ed. Nova Frontera, Botafogo, 1988; Die rote Jungfrau, ed. Steidl, Göttingen, 1990; The Red Virgin, Penguin Books, New York, London, 1993).
• La fille de King-Kong ed. Acropole, Paris, 1988 (La hija de King Kong, Barcelona, Seix Barral, 1988;
• L' extravagante croisade d'un castrat amoureux, ed. Ramsay, Paris, 1989 (La extravagante cruzada de un castrado enamorado, Barcelona, Seix Barral, 1990).
• La tueuse du jardin d'hiver, ed. Écriture, Paris, 1994
• Le funambule de Dieu, ed. Écriture, Paris, 1998
• Porté disparu, ed. Plon, Paris, 2000
• Champagne pour tous, ed. Stock, Paris, 2002.
• Como un paraíso de locos, 2008

Artist's books

Arrabal has created over seven hundred artists' books with Salvador Dalí

Salvador Dalí

Salvador Domènec Felip Jacint Dalí i Domènech, Marquis de Púbol , commonly known as Salvador Dalí , was a prominent Spanish Catalan surrealist painter born in Figueres,Spain....

, René Magritte

René Magritte

René François Ghislain Magritte[p] was a Belgian surrealist artist. He became well known for a number of witty and thought-provoking images...

, Roland Topor

Roland Topor

Roland Topor , was a French illustrator, painter, writer and filmmaker, known for the surreal nature of his work...

, Julius Baltazar, Antonio Saura

Antonio Saura

Antonio Saura was a Spanish artist and writer, one of the major post-war painters to emerge in Spain in the fifties whose work has marked several generations of artists and whose critical voice is often remembered.-Biography:He began painting and writing in 1947 in Madrid while suffering from...

, Olivier O. Olivier, Maxime Godard, Jean Cortot, Camacho

Camacho

Camacho is the last name of:* Alicia Sánchez-Camacho, a Spanish politician* Antonio Camacho Vizcaino, Spanish ministry of the interior* Carlos Camacho, a Guamanian politician* Carlos Camacho , a Colombian actor* Carlos S...

, Ralph Gibson

Ralph Gibson

Ralph Gibson is an American art photographer best known for his photographic books. His images often incorporate fragments with erotic and mysterious undertones, building narrative meaning through contextualization and surreal juxtaposition.Ralph Gibson studied photography while in the US Navy and...

, Enrico Baj

Enrico Baj

Enrico Baj was an Italian artist and writer on art. Many of his works show an obsession with nuclear war. He created prints, sculptures but especially collage. He was close to the surrealist and dada movements, and was later associatied with CoBrA. As an author he has been described as a leading...

, Gustavo Charif

Gustavo Charif

Gustavo Charif is an Argentine artist. He is a friend of dramaturg Fernando Arrabal. His works are a sort of surrealism mixed with the secular poetry of actual times....

, Milan Kundera

Milan Kundera

Milan Kundera , born 1 April 1929, is a writer of Czech origin who has lived in exile in France since 1975, where he became a naturalized citizen in 1981. He is best known as the author of The Unbearable Lightness of Being, The Book of Laughter and Forgetting, and The Joke. Kundera has written in...

, Michel Houellebecq

Michel Houellebecq

Michel Houellebecq , born Michel Thomas, 26 February 1958—or 1956 —on the French island of Réunion, is a controversial and award-winning French author, filmmaker and poet. To admirers he is a writer in the tradition of literary provocation that reaches back to the Marquis de Sade and Baudelaire;...

 and many others:

• ’’1975 L'odeur de Sainteté, (Ed. Yves Rivière, Paris). With Antonio Saura
  Antonio Saura
  Antonio Saura was a Spanish artist and writer, one of the major post-war painters to emerge in Spain in the fifties whose work has marked several generations of artists and whose critical voice is often remembered.-Biography:He began painting and writing in 1947 in Madrid while suffering from...
  
  . 2 copies.
• ’’1980 Cinq sonnets, cincq eaux-fortes, (Ed. André Biren, Paris). With Balthazar. 80 copies.
• ’’1991 Sous le flux libertin, (Ed. Robert et Lydie Dutrou, Paris). With Jean Cortot.
• ’’2004 Triptyque, (Ed. Menú, Cuenca). With Catherine Millet
  Catherine Millet
  Catherine Millet is a French writer, art critic, curator, and founder and editor of the magazine Art Press, which focuses on modern art and contemporary art....
  
   and Michel Houellebecq
  Michel Houellebecq
  Michel Houellebecq , born Michel Thomas, 26 February 1958—or 1956 —on the French island of Réunion, is a controversial and award-winning French author, filmmaker and poet. To admirers he is a writer in the tradition of literary provocation that reaches back to the Marquis de Sade and Baudelaire;...
  
  . 36 copies.
• 2008 Clitoris, poem with 56 translations (including the Czech version by Milan Kundera).

Poetry

His books include:

• 1963: La pierre de la folie, (Ed. Julliard, Paris).
• 1965: Cent sonnets, (Ed. El Ultimo Parnaso, Saragossa).
• 1985: Humbles paradis, (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris).
• 1993: Liberté couleur de femme ou Adieu Babylone, Poèmes cinématographiques, (Ed. Rougerie, Mortemart).
  • Arrabalesques – Lettres à Julius Baltazar, (Ed. Rougerie, Mortemart).
• 1997: Diez poemas pánicos y un cuento, (Ed. Caja Sur y Rute, Córdoba).

“La Pierre de la folie” (ed. Julliard, Paris, 1963) and "Humbles paradis" (ed. Christian Bourgois, 1985).

Plays

Arrabal has published over one hundred plays in nineteen volumes, performed around the world. His plays include, with selected translations noted:

• 1952
  • Le toit (unpublished).
  • Le Char de foin (unpublished).
  • La blessure incurable (unpublished).

• 1958
  • Oraison (Ed. Julliard, Paris) (Plays, Vol. 1. (Orison, etc. Trad. de Barbara Wright, London, Calder and Boyars, 1962); (Orazione, etc., ed. Lerici, Milan, 1962).
  • Les deux bourreaux (Ed. Julliard, Paris) (The two executioners, tr. Richard Howard, New York, Grove Press, 1960); (Plays, Vol. 1. The Two Executioners, etc., tr. Barbara Wright, London, Calder and Boyars,1962); (I due Carnefici, etc., ed. Lerici, Milan, 1962).
  • Fando et Lis (Ed. Julliard, Paris) (Plays, Vol. 1. (Fando and Lis, etc.) tr. Barbara Wright, London, Calder and Boyars,1962
  • Le cimetière des voitures (Ed. Julliard, Paris) (The Automobile Graveyard, tr. de Richard Howard, N. Y. Grove Press, 1960) (Plays, Vol. 1. The Car Cemetery, etc.). tr. Barbara Wright, London, Calder and Boyars,1962); (Automobil Kirkegaarden, Ed. Arena, Copenhagen, 1964).
• 1961
  • Guernica (Ed. Julliard, Paris); (Plays, Vol 2. (Guernica, etc., tr. Barbara Wright. London, Calder and Boyars, 1967).
  • Le labyrinthe (Ed. Julliard, Paris); (Plays, Vol 2. The Labyrinth, etc., tr. Barbara Wright. London, Calder and Boyars, 1967).
  • Le tricycle (Ed. Julliard, Paris); (Plays, Vol 2., The Tricycle, etc. tr. Barbara Wright. London, Calder and Boyars, 1967); (The Tricycle. Tr. David Herzberger, Modern International Drama, 9.2., 1976, 65–91).
  • Pique-nique en campagne (Ed. Julliard, Paris). (Picnic on the Battlefield, tr. James Hewitt, Evergreen Review 4.15, 1960, 76–90); (Pic-nic, etc. ed. Lerici, Milan, 1962); (Plays, Vol 2., Picnic on the Battlefield, etc., tr. Barbara Wright. London, Calder and Boyars, 1967).
  • La bicyclette du condamné (Ed. Julliard, Paris); (Plays, Vol 2.,The Condemned Man's Bicycle, etc., tr. Barbara Wright. London, Calder and Boyars, 1967).
• 1965
  • Le grand cérémonial (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris); (Plays, Vol. 3, The Grand Ceremonial, etc., tr. Jean Benedetti,. London: Calder and Boyars, 1970).
  • Cérémonie pour un noir assassiné (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris).
  • Cérémonie pour une chèvre et un nuage (Ed. Daily Bul).
• 1966
  • Le couronnement (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris).
  • Concert dans un oeuf (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris).
• 1967
  • L'architecte et l'empereur d'Assyrie (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris); (De Architekt en de Keiser van Assyrië, ed. Uitgeverij de Bezige Bij, Amsterdam, 1969); (Plays, Vol. 3, The Architect and the Emperor of Assyria, tr. Jean Benedetti, London, Calder and Boyars, 1970); (The Architect and the Emperor of Assyria, tr. Everard d'Harnoncourt and Adele Shank. New York: Grove Press, 1969); (Der Architekt und der Kaiser von Assyrien, ed. Kiepenheuer & Witsch, Berlin, 1971); (O Arquitecto e o Imperador da Assiria, ed. Desta, Sao-Paulo, 1976).
  • Les amours impossibles (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris); (Impossible Lovers, etc., tr. Bettina Knapp, The Drama Review 13, 1968, 71–86).
  • Les quatre cubes (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris).
  • La communion solennelle (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris); (First Communion, tr. Michel Benedikt, Modern Spanish Theatre, pp. 309–317. New York: E. P. Dutton, 1968); (Solemn Communion, etc., tr. Bettina Knapp, The Drama Review 13, 1968, 71–86); (Plays, Vol. 3, The Solemn Communion, etc., tr. John Calder. London: Calder and Boyars, 1970).
  • Streap-tease de la jalousie (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris); (Striptease of Jealousy, etc., tr. Bettina Knapp, The Drama Review 13, 1968, 71–86).
  • La jeunesse illustrée (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris).
  • Dieu est-il devenu fou ? (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris).
  • Une tortue nomée Dostoiëwsky
• 1968
  • Le jardin des délices (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris); (Garden of Delights, tr. Helen Gary Bishop and Tom Bishop, New York, Grove Press, 1974).
  • Bestialité érotique (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris).
  • Une tortue nommée Dostoïevski (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris).
  • Théâtre choisi (4 volumes en japonais) (Ed. Shichosha, Tokyo).
• 1969
  • ...Et ils passèrent des menottes aux fleurs (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris); (And They Put Handcuffs on the Flowers, tr. Charles Marowitz, New York, Grove Press, 1973).
  • L'aurore rouge et noire (Groupuscule de mon coeur; Tous les parfums d'Arabie; Sous les pavés la plage; Les fillettes) (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris).
  • Le lai de Barrabas (Le couronnement), (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris).
• 1970
• Happening at the Théâtre Plaisance in Paris in February (Grand-Guignol).
• 1972
  • Ars Amandi (opéra "Panique") (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris).
  • Dieu tenté par les mathématiques (opéra "Panique"), (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris).
  • Le ciel et la merde (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris).
  • La grande revue du XXe siècle (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris).
• 1975
• Jeunes barbares d'aujourd'hui (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris).
• 1976
  • La guerre de mille ans (Bella Ciao) (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris).
  • Sur le fil ou la ballade du train fantôme (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris).
• 1978
  • La tour de Babel (Oyez Patria mi affliccion) (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris).
  • La marche royale (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris).
  • Une orange sur le mont de Vénus (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris).
  • La gloire en images (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris).
  • Vole-moi un petit milliard, (Théâtre Bouffe) (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris).
  • Le pastaga des loufs ou Ouverture Orang-outan, (Théâtre Bouffe) (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris).
  • Punk et punk et colégram (Théâtre Bouffe) (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris).
• 1979
  • Inquisición (Ed. Don Quijote, Granada).
• 1980
  • Mon doux royaume saccagé (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris).
  • Le roi de Sodome (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris).
  • Le ciel et la merde II (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris).
• 1982
  • L'extravagante réussite de Jésus-Christ, Karl Marx et William Shakespeare (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris).
  • Lève-toi et rêve (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris).
• 1983
  • Le cheval-jument ou hommage à John Kennedy T.
• 1984
  • Les délices de la chair (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris).
  • La ville dont le prince était une princesse (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris).
• 1985
  • Bréviaire d'amour d'un haltérophile (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris).
  • Apokalyptica (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris).
  • La charge des centaures (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris).
• 1988
  • Les "cucarachas" de Yale (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris).
  • Une pucelle pour un gorille (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris).
  • La madonne rouge (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris).
  • La traversée de l'Empire (Ed. Christian Bourgois, Paris).
• 1989
  • L'extravagante croisade d'un révolutionnaire obese (Ed. Phi, Luxembourg).
• 1990
  • La nuit est aussi un soleil (Ed. Actes Sud).
  • Roues d'infortune (Ed. Actes Sud).
  • L'opéra de la Bastille (opéra écrit pour le bicentenaire de la Révolution française).
• 1992
  • Oeuvres Tome I, (théâtre, poésie, roman), (Ed. Spirali-Vel, Milan).
• 1994
  • Lully, (Ed. Actes Sud).
  • Entends la nuit douce qui marche, (Ed. Actes Sud).
  • Le fou rire des liliputiens, (Ed. Actes Sud).
• 1996
  • Comme un lis entre les épines, (Ed. Actes Sud).
• 1997
  • Théâtre complet, (7 volumes en langue coréenne), (Ed. Coréenne, Séoul).
• 1999
  • Lettre d'amour, (Ed. Actes Sud).
  • Comme un supplice chinois, (Ed. Actes Sud).
  • Théâtre complet, (2 volumes en langue espagnole), (Ed. Espasa, Madrid).
• 1997 and 2009.

By many estimates, Arrabal is probably the most performed living dramatic author worldwide. For a list of performances, see Arrabal’s official website.

Painting

• Fernando Arrabal has often described himself as a “frustrated painter.” He has produced around fifty canvases, a hundred or so drawings and collages, which have been exhibited in museums such as the Paris Art Center, Musée de Bayeux and the The Villa San Carlo Borromeo Art Museum, Milano.

• Is approach to painting consists of close collaboration with artists who produce large-format oils based on detailed sketches which he provides.

• In 1962, his first such painting was chosen for reproduction in the noted art publication, “La Brèche: Action Surréaliste Revue” by its founding editor, André Breton.

• Currently Fernando Arrabal is collaborating with the sculptor/video artist Christèle Jacob, with whom he has created a dozen videos and photomontage series, including “Les artilleurs des échecs et de la littérature” (The artillery corps of chess and literature), inspired by an artwork by Henri Rousseau (1909), and au “Rendez-vous du Corps des satrapes” (Meeting of the Satrap Association), based on a work by Max Ernst (1922).

Essays and Nonfiction

• Carta al General Franco, bilingual Spanish-French ed., Ch. Bourgois, col. 10–18, París, 1972; ed. Anonyme Anarchiste Pop., París, 1971; Ed. Granica, Buenos Aires, 1973; Ed. Babilonia, Noce, 1976; Ed. Actuales, Barcelona, 1978
• Le Panique, ed. Union Générale d'Edition, Paris, 1973
• Sur Fischer: Initiation aux échecs, ed. du Rocher, Monaco, 1974; revised edition “Fischer, le roi maudit,” Ed. Phi, Luxembourg, 1988.
• Carta a los militantes comunistas españoles (Sueño y mentira del eurocomunismo), bilingual Spanish-French ed., Ch. Bourgois, París, 1978; Ed. Actuales, Barcelona, 1978; Ed. Acción directa, 1980.
• Les échecs féeriques et libertaires: (articles from l'Express), Ed. du Rocher, Monaco, 1980.
• Carta a los comunistas españoles y otras cartas (Letters to Franco, to the King, etc.), Murcia, Ed. Godoy, 1981.
• Carta a Fidel Castro, Madrid, Playor, 1983; ed. Diana, Mexico, 1984; ed. Europa, América, Portugal, 1984.
• Echecs et mythe, ed. Payot, París, 1984; (Mitos em Xeque, ed. Globo, Río de Janeiro, 1988).
• Introducción a Feliciano de Silva, Ed. Cátedra, col. Letras Hispánicas, 1986
• El Greco, (ed. Kiepenheuer & Witsch, Steidl, 1991); (El Greco, ed. Destino, Barcelona, 1991); (El Greco, ed. Calder and Boyar, London; Grove Press-Viking, New York, 1991); (El Greco, ed. Spirali, Milan, 1991; (El Greco: Le frénétique du spasme, ed. Flohic, Paris, 1991).
• Goya / Dalí, ed. Spirali-Vel, Milan; Studio di Val Cervo, Rome, 1992.
• Fêtes et défaites sur l'échiquier, ed. l'Archipel, Paris, 1992.
• Cartas a Baltazar, versión de F. Torres Monreal, 1993.
• Genios y figuras, preface by A. Berenguer, Espasa Calpe, 1993.
• Las manazas del Samaritano. Conversaciones con Ionesco, rev. La Vuelta, nº 210, mayo, 1994.
• La dudosa luz del día, tr. into Spanish from the original French with notes by F. Torres Monreal, Espasa Calpe, 1994.
• Carta al Rey de España, (Ed. Espasa Calpe, Madrid), 1995
• Un esclave nommé Cervantès, ed Plon, Paris, 1996; (Un esclavo llamado Cervantes, ed. Espasa Calpe, Madrid, 1996).
• Diccionario pánico, Ed. Escritos, Bruxelles, 1998
• Lettre à Staline, Flammarion, Paris, 2004.
• Houellebecq!, éditions Le cherche midi, Paris, 2005.
• ”El Pánico. Manifiesto para el tercer milenio (2007)
• ” Diccionario pánico (2008)
• ”Universos arrabalescos (2009)
• ” Defensa de Kundera (2009)

Chess

Arrabal has a strong interest in chess

Chess

Chess is a two-player board game played on a chessboard, a square-checkered board with 64 squares arranged in an eight-by-eight grid. It is one of the world's most popular games, played by millions of people worldwide at home, in clubs, online, by correspondence, and in tournaments.Each player...

 and has attended many chess tournaments. He has close relations to American Grandmaster Gata Kamsky

Gata Kamsky

Gata Kamsky is a Soviet-born American chess grandmaster, and the current World Rapid Chess Champion. He is also the current United States Chess Champion. As of September 2011, he is rated No. 1 in the United States and No...

 and has advocated for Kamsky in his chess blog during Kamsky's negotiations with FIDE (the World Chess Federation) over a match in the World Chess Championship

World Chess Championship

The World Chess Championship is played to determine the World Champion in the board game chess. Men and women of any age are eligible to contest this title....

 cycle.

For over thirty years, Fernando Arrabal has written a column on chess for the French weekly L’Express.

• Echecs et mythes
• Fêtes et défaites sur l'échiquier
• Les échecs féériques et libertaires
• Bobby Fischer
  Bobby Fischer
  Robert James "Bobby" Fischer was an American chess Grandmaster and the 11th World Chess Champion. He is widely considered one of the greatest chess players of all time. Fischer was also a best-selling chess author...
  
  : el rey maldito

External links

• Fernando Arrabal's website
• Fernando Arrabal: Excerpts, articles, interviews and videos on the website of the Prague Writers' Festival
• Fernando Arrabal's Cinématon – A 4 minutes online portrait by Gérard Courant
• Chess Express Arrabal Arrabal's chess blog