My name is Daniela. I’m a writer, born and raised in Colombia. In March 2021, I received an acceptance letter to the Master’s in Creative Writing at the University of Oxford. It felt like a childhood dream was coming true. Three months later, I packed my life into a 23kg suitcase and took off.
The classes went smoothly, the people were wonderful, and the town was as magical as I had always imagined. In short, everything — except, of course, the infamous British winter — was perfect!
But there was always a pebble in my shoe, tiny but bothersome. The mental library I had built, gathering readings over the years, was very different from that of my classmates. Sure, we knew each other’s classics. I was well familiar with Chaucer, Shakespeare, and Tolkien, and they had read Cervantes, García Márquez, and Borges. But we were mostly in the dark when it came to each other’s contemporary literature. I discovered English-speaking authors whose work is brilliant, but unreachable to my friends back home. Likewise, I realized many of the Spanish books that shaped me were completely unknown to my classmates.
This situation sparked in me a desire to bridge the gap between the two cultures I inhabit. I vowed to share some of the stories that touched me with the people I love, regardless of their language. That’s what inspired me to start Patacon Press.
Fun fact! This photo shows the inside of the Radcliffe Camera, Oxford’s most iconic building.
English (UK) 
Español de Colombia