You didn't have to spend long with him to realise who Carlos Pérez de Rozas was: full of life, generous, polemicist, explosive, intuitive, wise and with an innate ability to remember anecdotes, which he would tell at any time, which would always make him the centre of attention and which would have everyone listening to him with genuine interest. You were always learning from Carlos: at the newspapers, in the faculty, at a restaurant, watching a football match or with Indro Montanelli, who we visited in Italy in 2001, a few months before his death. In a profession with such a propensity to criticise people's achievements, Carlos always stood out and would have words of congratulations, encouragement or wisdom for anyone, whatever their rank. Whether it was the owner of the newspaper who almost everyone would talk to using the usted formal verb conjugation or the latest intern he'd maybe never see again. That was Carlos: polite and a good person.
I coincided with Pérez de Rozas at the three great newsrooms in Barcelona of the Spanish transition to democracy: El Periódico (1978), the Catalan edition of El País (1982) and La Vanguardia (1995). Always obsessed with the newspaper's design and image and with an unbeatable photo that would end up being, last thing, the newspaper's front page the next day. One of his greatest pleasures was seeing what all the others had done; with all the designs on your desk you knew perfectly well that Carlos' was the best. He would win most times, but would also admit it when someone had done better than him. He was humble and an implacable protector of his layout designers, photojournalists and graphic designers, as a good deputy editor in charge of art at La Vanguardia.
I remember his role during three moments from the beginning of the century. The 11th September attacks on New York's Twin Towers, the 11th March 2004 attack on Atocha station in Madrid and the following days up to Zapatero's victory in the general election, and the death of John Paul II in 2005, his funeral and the conclave for the election of the new pope, Benedict XVI. From hundreds of photographs, Carlos would select a few for the front page meeting. He would let you choose between a couple of dozen (in practice he always had his favourite) and together with his layout team and his inseparable Alberola he would give life to the newspaper's front page.
His great heart stopped in Madrid early this Saturday at 71. Journalism has lost one of the greats of a generation without whom so many things cannot be explained. A simply exceptional professional.