Another student just slaughtered:
Riera’s protagonist is part of Barcelona’s aristocracy. We know she belongs to the upper class because she grows fat. If she has money to buy so much food as to get fat, she has to be from a very rich family.
An American student from the Midwest writing this is . . . I don’t know, words fail me right now. Where do they get this stuff?
Clarissa's Blog 
“An American student from the Midwest writing this is . ..”
…not surprising at all. 😦
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You think that the fat people in the Midwest are all rich aristocrats? 🙂
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No, I think this student is simply an ignorant.
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I think many American students have been told that there were times and places where only the rich could get fat. I take it that is not true of the setting of the novel in question?
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Contemporary Catalonia. I mean, there is an economic crisis but not to that extent. 🙂
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Contemporary Catalonia has an aristocracy? That would explain a lot…..
Your point would have been clearer had you been clear that this isn’t about some XVII or XIX century novel.
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“Contemporary Catalonia has an aristocracy? That would explain a lot…..”
– Oh yes. It’s financial aristocracy, of course.
“Your point would have been clearer had you been clear that this isn’t about some XVII or XIX century novel.”
– Sorry, my mistake. I assumed everybody knew Carme Riera.
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“I assumed everybody knew Carme Riera”
Oh…. (looks at ground) Carme RIERA! I thought you said Carme Ribera! but Carme Riera! Of course, of course! (looks to the side tries to think of a way to change the subject…)
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The use of the word ‘aristocracy’ makes me think he traveled a century back in time. There are countries and places that stay in your mind in a certain time in history. I had a penpal in Croatia. Her accounts made me fixate the country in an ongoing state of war. Just recently I had lapsus before I realized that’d been over long ago.
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It was actually an African tribal standard of beauty, to be fat. At least I’m pretty sure it was, although like everything that hints about differences, this might be a controversial point. The Ndebele King Lobengula, who was tricked out of his land and power by the British, was also a heavy fellow by all accounts.
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