Aux livres et aux femmes je chante

A woman was almost called "Avioneta" (Small Airplane) at birth. Another had a library in the back seat of her car. Yet another fractures her finger with the rebel shelves of her bookshop. Lectors read to cigar makers while they work. Women remember poems while they iron. And to them all I sing. Standing against fire, water, moths, dust, ignorance and fanaticism, an anonymous female army looks after books. An intimate resistance, lacking epic events, revolution or weapons.

"A los libros y a las mujeres canto (To Books and Women I Sing) is titled after a cleverly rewritten quote from Virgil. This bold opening gesture already announces what lies at the heart of the film: the civilising role of women and literature. María Elorza's first feature is structured around four portraits of women and their libraries (containing more than books). While there is much admiration in the director’s gaze, this documentary is the opposite of the heroic-epic narratives so characteristic of a male-centred culture: the director wants to give voice to (and sing with) the kinds of characters and stories that often remain at the margins of literature and cinema – while paying homage to the earthiness of these spirited women.
This is a film notable for its conscious anti-grandiosity: humble, playful, curious, complicit, and very affectionate. A los libros y a las mujeres canto combines interviews, archival material, photos, paintings, home movies, witty intertitles, song and film extracts. With this array of materials, Elorza interweaves a dialogue between film and literature, and between different generations of women. Founded on the belief that “literature doesn’t belong only to scholars or enlightened people”, this is a documentary where passion, commitment, preservation and transmission matter more than genius."
(Cristina Álvarez López - IFFR International Film Festival Rotterdam)

Una mujer casi fue llamada Avioneta. Otra tuvo una biblioteca en el asiento trasero de su coche. Una más se fractura un dedo con los estantes rebeldes de su librería. Las cigarreras escuchan lecturas mientras trabajan. Las planchadoras recuerdan poemas. A todas ellas, les canto. Contra fuego, agua, polilla, polvo, ignorancia y fanatismo, un ejército anónimo de mujeres cuida de los libros. Es una resistencia íntima, sin épica, sin revolución, sin armas.