This article is about the Catalan grammarian. For the university, see Pompeu Fabra University.
Spanish engineer and grammarian (1868–1948)
In this Catalan name, the first or paternal surname is Fabra and the second or maternal family name is Poch; both are generally joined by the conjunction "i".
Pompeu Fabra was born in Gràcia, which at that time was still separate from Barcelona, in 1868. He was the last of twelve children born to Josep Fabra i Roca and his wife Carolina Poch i Martí. When Pompeu was six, the family moved to Barcelona.
Despite his personal interest in linguistics, Fabra studied industrial engineering in Barcelona and in 1902 accepted a chair of chemistry position at the School of Engineering in Bilbao.[1] During his tenure in Bilbao, Fabra participated actively in the First International Congress of the Catalan Language held in 1906. This event gave him a certain prestige in the field of Catalan linguistics. In 1911, he returned to Barcelona to become a professor (catedràtic) of Catalan — a position created by the diputació (local government) of Barcelona — and a member of the department of philology at the newly created Institut d'Estudis Catalans, of which he would later become president. In 1912 he published his Gramática de la lengua catalana (in Spanish).
The Institute published the Normes ortogràfiques in 1913, the Diccionari ortogràfic in 1917, and its official Gramàtica catalana in 1918.[1] That same year, Fabra also edited the textbook Curs mitjà de gramàtica catalana, published by l'Associació Protectora de l'Ensenyança Catalana. His "Converses filològiques," first published in the newspaper "La Publicitat," were later collected as "Popular Barcino." Probably his most famous work was the Diccionari General de la Llengua Catalana (1932), the first edition of which later became the Institute's official dictionary.
Pompeu Fabra in Badalona (Pompeu Fabra is located in the center)
In 1932, owing to his scientific prestige, he was unanimously named a professor (catedràtic) of the Republican Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (not to be confused with the later Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona created in the 1960s during the Francoist régime). The following year he was named President of the University's governing council, which resulted in his imprisonment in 1934 following the "events of 6 October" when troops of the Second Spanish Republic put down a Catalan government uprising led by Lluis Companys.[1]
Fabra was reinstated as a professor after the elections of February 1936, but in July of that year the Spanish Civil War began and he had to flee his country when Barcelona was invaded by Franco's army. In 1939 he went into exile in France, where he suffered many hardships. He lived in Paris and Montpellier, where he presided over the Jocs Florals literary contest in 1946. The Spanish government, led by Francisco Franco, fine him Pompeu Fabra for being (the fine says) "A separatist element against the general interests of Spain." He eventually moved to Prada de Conflent, in the Catalan-speaking part of France, where he died on December 25, 1948. At some point during his exile, he made a will in Andorra, to be made in a country where Catalan was the official language.
Legacy
Every year, his tomb in the Cuixà monastery near Prada is visited by thousands of Catalans.
