Homage To a Lost Generation....

We belong to a generation that has, for the most part, forgotten the sacrifices and hardships suffered by our grand-parents and great-grand parents in the 20^th century. We live in the best of times, because they lived in some of the worst of times.

Nothing illustrates this more than delving into the complicated world of the history of the Spanish Civil War. The 1930s were a time when, in spite of literary works such as The Great Gatsby and Little House on the Prairie, western society was undergoing such a magnificent turmoil, it would take over half a century for things to straighten themselves out. Homage to Catalonia by George Orwell has been a popular classic for over fifty years now.

Orwell’s combination of on the spot journalistic style combined with the now clichéd charm of a middle-class man espousing working-class sympathies has given many readers enjoyment and pause for thought. I’m a great believer, though, in combining reading experiences, and other media, to get a better grasp of the bigger picture. We have the advantage, of course, of buckets full of hindsight, numerous books have addressed the subject of the Spanish Civil War since its end. For my money you can’t  do much better for a wide-ranging slice of the story, than I Am Spain by David Boyd Haycock. Ernest Hemingway and Joris Ivens’ 1937 film, The Spanish Earth lends a wider perspective to the conflict which I would definitely recommend after reading about the war. Propaganda, whatever its perspective, should never be swallowed without an accompanying dose of other frames of reference.

Haycock does an excellent job of bringing together the experiences of the writers that seemed to flood Spain during the conflict. He also offers a helpful chronological approach to the narrative, essential in such a complex story. An added dimension to understanding the conflict is available with the wonders of modern technology via YouTube.

For me, the 1930s in Europe, and gradually across the rest of the world, became about the fight between two conflicting ideologies, Communism and Fascism. This fight would continue to reap a horrendous toll on human life through the decades of the 30s, 40s, 50s, and on into the 60s and 70s, to a lesser degree, as communism became the remaining threat. In many ways; the mediocre, beige world we now inhabit is the best, or at least safest scenario, when compared to the world we might be enduring without such a conflict having taken place.