The latest addition to my website is Llorenç Villalonga‘s Mort de dama [Death of a Lady]. This was Villalonga’s first book and was a wicked satire on the Mallorcan upper class of the day. The eponymous lady is Obdulia de Monteada and, as the title and the beginning of the book tell us, she is dying and will die by the end of the book, though she takes her time doing so. She is eighty-four, realises that she is going to die and takes to her bed. We follow her scathing criticism of various people – her relatives, other Mallorcan aristocrats, foreigners and modern women. We see those who expect to inherit at least something – all will be disappointed. For the Mallorcan aristocrat of the day -and that very much included Obdulia – dying and funerals were the highlight of their lives. High society turns up and gossips while we also learn about the past – the aristocrat who died in a brothel and the lady poet who cannot rhyme. The book is wickedly funny but sadly not available in English.