Clotilde Cerdá, whose stage name was Esmeralda Cervantes, was a child prodigy on the harp who left us a dozen compositions and traveled the world giving concerts. But Clotildina was much more than that. The illegitimate daughter of the famous urban planner Ildefonso Cerdá and the painter Clotilde Bosch, she became an enigmatic and barely remembered figure who crossed borders, genres, and dogmas. From her closeness to Queen Isabella II, she went on to teach in the harem of the Sultan of Constantinople, inspired the Ecuadorian writer Juan Montalvo, became a Freemason, founded the Academy for the Enlightenment of Women, and fought with determination and conviction for women's freedoms and dignity. The famous islands of Barcelona's Eixample district are also a metaphor for other, more intimate islands: the inner territories of a free, visionary, and unconventional woman, whose existence unfolds in this novel like a passionate map.
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