The prize-winning novelist Juan Mars?, born in Barcelona in 1933, is widely-read not only within Spain but also in translation, for his often provocative portrayals of life in post-war Barcelona. Clark's study discusses Mars?'s engagement with Catholic popular culture, Spanish National Catholicism and Catalan Catholic Nationalism, exploring his subversion of iconic imagery as an ironic sub-textual commentary on political ideology, by which he is able to experiment with outer reality and inner reconstructions of experience. Dr Clark shows how religious and profane visions of love are subtly intertwined, how the tales told by children and the novel form itself are interrelated, and finally how a variety of biblical topoi, ranging from the Garden of Eden to the Song of Songs, are deployed in Mars?'s fiction. Particular attention is paid to La oscura historia de la prima Montse, Si te dicen que ca and Im genes y recuerdos. ROSEMARY CLARK lectures in the department of Spanish and Portuguese, University of Cambridge. El novelista Juan Mars?, nacido en Barcelona en 1933 y ganador de varios premios internacionales, es un autor muy le?do no solamente en Espa?a sino tambi?n en otros pa?ses del mundo, a trav?s de traducciones, y su obra se aprecia especialmente por sus descripciones provocativas de la vida cotidiana en la Barcelona de posguerra. La monograf?a de Clark analiza el profundo inter?s que sent?a Mars? por la cultura popular cat?lica y el nacionalcatolicismo - tanto en su forma espa?ola como en su forma catalana. Demuestra que la manera en que Mars? utiliza los ?conos y las proyeciones visuales del Catolicismo constituye un comentario ir?nico y sutil sobre la ideolog?a pol?tica de la ?poca franquista. Las novelas de Mars? - especialmente La oscura historia de la prima Montse, Si te dicen que ca? y Im?genes y recuerdos -- exploran los lindes entre la realidad objetiva y la reconstrucci?n sujetiva de aquella realidad en el mundo de la ficci?n.