FROM THE EDITOR’S DESK

              Several months ago we mentioned the case of the documents stolen by Franco’s troops from the Generalitat, official buildings, and private residences during the last few weeks of the Spanish Civil War and the first months  of the so-called peace. A few weeks ago EL TEMPS published  an interesting summary of how that was done. The summary is taken from a book, soon to be published, whose title is “1937-1939. L’espoliació del patrimoni documental i bibliogràfic de Catalunya” The author is Josep Cruanyes i Tor, a historian and a lawyer, and the book will be published by Group 62.
          It is interesting to realize, too, that in 1937, ten months after the beginning of the Spanish Civil War, an “Oficina de Investigación y Propaganda Antimarxista” was already created. Its job was to confiscate all kinds of documents in the areas occupied by the army. From the very beginning, those documents were taken both from official buildings and from private homes.
          In June of that same year, after Bilbao had been taken, the “Oficina” began collecting all kind of documents  and continued to do so during the months of war in Asturias and the Basque Land.
          In April 1938 the confiscation of documents began in the first Catalan and Valencian zones. In January 1939 the attack was centered on Catalonia. Documents from Tarragona and Lleida were confiscated. On the 26th Barcelona was taken. On February the 8th, documents about  Catalan freemasons are transferred to Salamanca. On the 10th of February all Catalonia has been taken and a systematic search to confiscate documents began in Barcelona. Catalonia is considered an accupied territory and the order is given to send all  public and private documents to Salamanca.
          In June 3rd, 1700 searches had been  done in Barcelona in public institutions, political parties headquarters, unions, associations, and private citizens’ homes. In June and July twelve freight wagons carrying more than 100 tones of material went to Salamanca. All the documents taken in Lleida, Tarragona, Igualada and Linyola had already been sent there.
          Those are some specific points taken from the summary in EL TEMPS. More information can be found both in the magazine and in the book by Cruanyes.
         One must remember that most of the stolen documents were taken from the archives of the Generalitat, the legal representation of the Catalan government; others were taken, as we said above, from the archives of  unions, universities, Masonic lodges, and private residences. They were primarily used, during many months, to form lists of people who were executed  week after week: members of  unions, republicans, nationalists, Catalanists, socialists, communists and all kinds of people.     
          As we mentioned some months ago, when after years of discussion the Council of Ministers of the socialist government finally decided that the papers should be given back to their owners, a well known Spanish writer surrounded by hundreds of people in Salamanca declared that the papers were Salamanca’s property “by the right of conquest” That was a revival of the two Spains in war. Now the new minister of Culture, Ms. Pilar del Castillo, has answered the same petition saying that “History cannot be fragmented” No member of the Spanish government will ever admit that those papers were stolen from the site of a legal government and from private citizens and institutions. And after the minister words the Spanish television presented hundreds of people in a central square in Salamanca carrying big signs saying things like: “Salamanca wins the war of the Archives” and “The Archive will be undivided and we will not give in to Catalonia”. 
 Well-known hispanists have clearly spoken against the decision of not giving back  the papers. Among them Ian Gibson and Paul Preston, an many historians in several European universities.
          It is interesting to stop for a moment and consider who is really working to mark a difference between Spain and Catalonia. Let us look just at one simple instance. A few weaks ago the newspapers were dealing with the acoustic contamination at the airports. The Spanish airports are ruled by AENA, which means Aeropuertos Españoles y Navegación Aérea. Well, AENA has decided to cancel all communications in Catalan in the Catalan airports in order to reduce the acoustic contamination! No other language contaminates the atmosphere, it seems. Only Catalan. In Catalonia.

THE CATALAN VICTORY OF 1705
CHAPTER XV  (continued)

THE HONOR OF LEADERSHIP

          Taking the castle of Montjuïc in September was a decisive step toward the conquest of Barcelona. The death of prince George during the attack of the 14th left the military and political course of the whole war under the influence of men like Peterborough, who either had not been at the beginning of the fight or had not followed it from the beginning, as prince George had, and did not love Catalonia as prince George did. His death  left a big gap in the question as to whom did belong the honor of the batle of Montjuïc. A gap that several people wanted to fill up, most of all Peterborough. A defeat is always orphan, whereas a victory has always many parents.
            News about the taking of Montjuïc appeared first on October 1705 in the Dutch “Mercury”, and it appeared as follows: “On September 13th the prince of Hessen-Darmstadt told the count of Peterborough that  if the castle were taken the city would not be difficult to conquer and that he was personally willing to try to do it with a thousand men. Then he explained to Peterborough how he intended to do it. After listening to his project, Peterborough approved the proposal and even affirmed to be willing to participate in the attack."
           This is the older version. The versions coming from Castellví, Richards, and other authors were written as memoirs some years later. Dutch journalists were less inclined to distort things  than others who were more personally involved.
          The newest version comes from the English writer David Francis. He says that the Catalan deserters  were probably “miquelets” and that they spoke to George. George spoke to Charles III, who told Peterborough and Shovel in a meeting on board of the “Brittania” on the 11th. All was kept in secret, even for the admirals and generals. Richards himself, who was very close to Peterborough, did not know anything about it.
          This version is roughly the one shared by Parnell, who was a supporter of the prince. Parnell adds to it that Georges presented his project to Peterborough with the idea of making the latter change his mind about all of them going to Tarragona and Valencia. Georges thought that if Peterborough began to fight and they were able to take Montjuïc, then he would understand that to leave Barcelona at that moment was impossible. London would never forgive abandoning a siege that was opening the road to victory.
          The opposed version is based on  Richards’ memoirs and in the apocryphal memoirs of captain Carleton that, in fact, came from Peterborough himself. Among our historians, Voltes accepted it, perhaps without researching the problem that was hidden there. This version says, more or less, that Peterborough said to prince George:”I have decided to attack the enemy tonight. So, if you will, you can assess our doings and see if my officers and my soldiers deserve your senseless slander."
           These would have been bitter words between two men that had not been speaking to each other for two weeks, and they were said in front of colonel Richards. It is difficult to believe, because at  3 o’clock PM on the 13th  the troops had to be ready to set off towards Montjuïc. At least, they were inspected at that time.
          On the other hand, modern writers deny  there was as much tension as Richards says. Burnet, in his book published some years later (1735) and called “Histoire de ce que s’est passé de plus mémorable en Anglaterre pendant la vie de Gilbert Burnet, éveque de Salisbury”, writes:
                   “A  council of war got together to consider what to do. Stanhope, who was there, told me that all of them, the English as well as the Dutch, thought  the siege was impossible both because of the weakness of the assailants and because of the strength of the garrison. On the other hand, they agreed that there was nothing worth to be assaulted in the surrounding area. Therefore they believed that time should not be wasted. and that they should all embark at once. And that they should carefully consider the course to take, to see if there was still time for the fleet to move on those waters. And that if no important action could be undertaken in the time  they could still be there, then they should go back to England. The only man opposed to that was the prince of Hessen-Darmstadt, who wanted the siege to go on. He said he was sure of the good feelings of many of the inhabitants, and even dared to guarantee a favorable outcome. Since nobody else knew the information that he must have had, those who did not share the information could not agree with him.
                  “The discussion went on for hours. Finally the king himself spoke. He spoke during half an hour, undoing every one of the objections that had been presented against the siege, addressing himself with utmost courtesy to each of the men who had presented them. He added that what the prince of Hessen-Darmstadt had said was true, and that he himself was aware of it. He also said that, as things were at the moment, great difficulties might appear everywhere, and that in all cases fate would play a good role. He added that in spite of everything, the decision to go on with the siege in the right way was the less dangerous decision.  Many of his subjects had been there ro recognize him as their king  at the risk of their lives and so it was for him a question of personal honor to show them that he was ready to share their destiny. The king hoped that the allies would be at his side  at least until some attempts had been made, and a bad outcome could show to the whole country that a victory was impossible. Finally, he said that if the allies were required to leave him because of orders they had received, he himself could not forsake his own subjects. 
                  “After hearing these words, everybody agreed to go on with the siege. All of them were amazed that a prince so young and so little used to State negotiations had been able to reason so strongly in such a sensitive matter, and to show clearly  that his was a  heroic decision. Afterwards it was known that it had been a good resolution, because it was said that, after hearing that the allies were thinking of going away with the fleet it was said that the “miquelets” and the Catalans that flew to the allies side, understanding  that they would be left there abandoned, had decided to kill as many allies as possible before they went on board. They would do that either as a revenge (against the allies) or to receive mercy (from Velasco).”
              It is difficcult to pinpoint the exact place and time of that meeting.   It looks as a summary of ideas about the councils of war that had been held.  It is interesting to see that they supposed George to have so concrete and specific knowldge of the situation to be really able to change it. A knowledge shared by the king. But not by Peterborough, as it seems. A feeling of scorn towards our men is evident in thoughts and words. Oh, the poor fifteen thousand English and Dutch men, well armed and with cannons and ships! A handful of Catalans, around six or seven thousand, badly armed, would have killed those allies as pigs in the slaughtering season! This is the same style used by Carleton talking about the dangers Peterborough had to face. That  is why  Peterborough’s memories were considered, for quire a while, to be just a novel with a historical background.
          Burnet’s meeting can be neither the one held on the 8th nor the one held on the 11th.If it was the one held on the 9th, they would not have had the admirals being told what Schratenbach’s aide told van Almonde. It could not be the one held on the 11th  on board of the “Brittania”, since Burnet mentions a meeting of land generals. If it is a concrete meeting and not a summary of the several that happened then, we must place it on the 12th or the 13th, after George and Charles had already spoken in complete secret with Peterborough and Shovel on the 11th.
          It is logical that, after making so many decisions, a meeting with the generals would be organized.  They were asked to accept, at the last moment, to remain in Barcelona to help preparing the attack that  had to begin  the night of the 13th. Stanhope, Southwell, Charlemont, and Sint Amand, who had to be in it, could not go from one position to the other without being told about it. They had to be in charge of everything needed for the attack.And if they had been allowed to go on preparing to leave, they could not have been told to organize the attack.
          It seems to me that this ends the legend of the generals that did not know anything of the action that was beeing prepared. If the legend were true, who would have organized that action?  The fact that they did not know every little detail is normal in all military undertakings. But it seems to me impossible to maintain the position of saying  that they did not know, indirectly, there would be help from inside the castle when the attack would be on.
          Burnet’s account brings to mind to us Catalans the Catalan revenge in the Eastern expedition after the death of the leader Roger de Flor. The fact that Stanhope was talking of it to Burnet shows the guilty conscience the British had about forsaking the Catalans. And if it were true that the Catalans had spoken about going against those that would leave them in that mess, that would show that the Catalan leaders were not as stupid as the English had wanted to show them to be.

CHAPTER XVI

 MONTJUÏC

          The attack to the castle of Montjuïc on the 14th of September of 1705 was an important event of the siege and. therefore, of the War of Succession. On that day the Catalans had a hand in the march of history not only in our country but also in the Peninsula in general, and in a great part of Europe. Therefore, we should give it its due importance and thoroughly explain what happened.
          The castle, that now still seems to dominate the city from the top of the mountain, was at that time different from the one existing today and was not as wide. The mountain had not suffered  the constructive and destructive attacks of the generations to come, and it was still keeping the wild appearance of a craggy rock that seemed unapproachable from the sea but appear easier on the side of the land. It was a rocky hump with just a few trees, covered with bushes, rockrose, broom, rosemary and thyme, furze and gorse. It had been furrowed by the paths leading to the castle, and by those that went on to reach the esplanade of the delta of the Llobregat river.
          The ramparts of the city, leveled with the sea, ended on the shipyards on the west. Today parts of them still stand. Further away there was the open field. A path began in the Portal de Sant Bertran, went up the mountain and, still on the edge of the sea, met a very small fortress. The path was placed approximately at one third of the mountain’s height and came down again towards sea level when it reached the wild side of the mountain under the castle. From there, it went a little around the low ridge and entered the Pla del Llobregat. The lower part of what then was a local road is today an avenue called Passeig de Colom.
          A more important fortress than the one we just found was placed a little higher. It was situated about where today we have the Miramar esplanade. It was called Sant Bertran  because once a hermitage in honor of that Saint had been there. The name is also remembered in the Portal above mentioned. The fortress was an irregular quadrilateral space with protecting bastions. Although it was not a castle, it was indeed more important than the small construction found at sea level. The road from the Portal de Sant Bertran to the castle was in front of it. The military function of this fortress was watching over the port from close up and also to defend the portal of the castle.       
          The road that went to the castle became very steep and, in front of the castle’s door, it converged with a smoother one from behind the mountain that was coming out of the Portal de Sant Antoni. Both of them together formed an esplanade in front of the castle’s door.
          This road that came from the Portal of Sant Antoni to the castle had come together, near its end, with another one that came from the Portal de Sant Jaume and that, protected by a low wall, went up to the castle. This was also called the “covered road”  because it was protected by the low wall and could not be seen by the ships  that might be on the harbor. Therefore it was not an ordinary road but a protected military path, to avoid that the movements of troops from the castle to the city and viceversa might be seen by possible enemies.
          The three roads we just mentioned were the only ones that went to the castle’s portal. Little paths going west were found in the mountain’s hump. But even if they had not been there, it would have been easy to reach the castle on that side, or to go from the castle to meet the roads that went to the Pla del Llobregat. On that side the Montjuïc’s hum was gradually flattened.
          The castle was shaped as an irregular quadrilateral. First there were the walls with the read opened over them. Then there was a big valley and, inside that, a new area of higher walls, reinforced with the bastions. The latter presented different shapes, since they had been made  using the ground as it had been left after all the constructions of the past centuries. In the corner of the area  in front of the sea, higher than the place where the cemetery is today, there was a fortress shaped as a four`point star with the castle tower in the middle, the tower that was called the donjon in medieval castles. At the sea side the wall was up over the cliff and no valley was needed.
          The open road that went to the Portal de Sant Jaume had a small fortress near the Sant Bertran’s fort. From there the wall and the road went down to meet the city walls. The small fortress was called fortress of Sant Ramon.
          These were all the mountain’s fortifications: the castle, the fort of Sant Bertran, and the small fortress near the water, in front of the harbor and, in the middle pont of the covered road, the fort of Sant Ramon. The western side of the castle was not  protected.. Walking in the mountain was easy there.  A square convent with a closed garden, Santa Madrona, was at the point where  years later the work for the 1929 Fair began. As a strong building, this convent  could be used as a fortress if needed. The convent towered  above the road of the Pla del Llobregat , which came from the Portal de Sant Antoni.
          Parnell, who was first of all a military man and then a writer, has left us a description of  the military value of the castle. Keeping in mind that Parnell felt a strong admiration for prince George and therefore for the Catalan friends, his description may be interesting to us. In our history that castle has often played the role of an instrument of oppression and, because of that, we may have considered it surrounded by an aureole of power  that perhaps was not justified. This is what he says:
           “In the condition they were then, the exterior works of the castle were rather an element of weakness for Montjuïc except for a short period. Those works were only a bench of soil and loose stones, with a small excavation in front. There was neither a valley nor a parapet, and the soil piled up outside could serve as a hiding place for the attacking troops, protecting them from the fire that could come from inside the casstle.
          “The castle itself was a closed square area of some  forty canes ( 320 inches) long, with a small bastion at each end. It had a good slope, a valley, a covered way and glacis. But it had no shelter against bombs and cannon shots. If attacked by artillery it could present no strong resistence. The garrison was formed by the troops of lieutenant general De Caraccioli, since Velasco did not trust Having Spanish troops there becausse of the isolation of the castle from the city”.
          We will leave now the stones and will begin to look at the people who were in the action.

                                                                                                             Antoni Porta
(to be continued)
To the interested reader: LA VICTÒRIA CATALANA DE 1705 by Dr. Antoni Porta  can be ordered from                
Clara Prat. 
Sant Pau, 16
08340 Vilassar de Mar. Barcelona. Spain
Price $20 postage and handling included. Sent check or money order with  your order. Please allow 6-8 weeks for delivery.

  

JOCS FLORALS DE LA LLENGUA CATALANA (1941-1951)
 (Continuació)

Els Jocs Florals de l’exili tenien, en origen i com a component principal, la voluntat col.lectiva d’afirmació nacional catalana als diversos països que els acollien, alhora reforçat per un ben manifest sentiment antifranquista que els feia  especialment atractius en els medis de l’intel.lectualitat i la política del món occidental. Afegim-hi l’entusiasme creatiu dels escriptors exiliats –en nombre i importáncia considerables- i llavors se’ns fa entenedor el gran èxit assolit arreu, a l’Amèrica i a Europa.

L’Any 1945 va correspondre a Colòmbia l’organització dels Jocs. Allà varen coincidir un grup de catalans francament reduït, entre vells residents i nouvinguts, però prou actiu i selecte com per assolir gran brillantor, amb el Teatre Colón ple, cedit pel Govern Nacional. Sense apartar-se del cànons de catalanitat que defineixen la Festa, varen celebrar-se amb la presència  -mai més repetida de manera tan nombrosa- de ministres, polítics i intel.lectuals del país, alguns d’ells catalanòfils reputats. Hi hagué premis extraordinaris per a treballs en gallect i en basc, i entre els autors catalans premiats s’escau destacar Ramon Vinyes –radicat a Barranquilla- immortalitzat com el sabio catalán per Gabriel Garcia Márquez a Cien años de soledad... Josep M. Capdevila, el capdavant de l’equip de mantenidors, va tenir paraules emotives de recordació al centenari del naixement de Jacint Verdaguer. I un afegit: tot i que també hi hagué invitats espanyols republicans, l’específica catalanitat de l’acte va provocar, posteriorment, una tremenda reacció anticatalana capitanejada per un connotat membre del que havia estat el Govern de Negrín durant la guerra.

Però eren moments d’eufòria, amb l’acabament de la World War II, i fins i tot es va pensar que els Jocs Florals ja es podrien reintegrar a Barcelona! No va ser així, però s’hi varen acostar, en terra occitana: el maig de  1947 es varen celebrar a Montpeller, al Teatre Municipal de l’Òpera. Va ser una gran Festa de germanor occitano-catalana, amb noms preclars, com Pompeu Fabra, Antoni Rovira i Virgili, Ventura Gassol, Joan Amade, Peire Azemar, Enric Guiter, el jove Heribert Barrera... I dues personalitats que serien el suport eficaç dels Jocs sempre més: Manuel Alcàntara i Gusart, des de Mèxic, que és  qui obrí el camí cap a Montpeller, i Miquel Guinart, que hi residia,  responsables tots dos de coordinar la Festa els anys següentsl La quantitat d’obres rebudes es va doblar en relació a l’Havana, que és on hi havia hagut més participació fins llavors.

No hi hagué retorn possible a Barcelona i semblava que els Jocs Florals es quedarien a Europa. El 1947 a Londres, amb Mercè  Rodoreda com a guanyadora de la Flor Natural. El 1948 a París, celebrats al gran anfiteatre de la Sorbona, amb una envergadura literária dificilment superable en el món català, degut a l’excepcional concentració de noms il.lustres.  També va ser notable la presència francesa, amb Ybon Delbos, ara Ministre d’Educació, durant la Guerra Civil Ministre d’Afers Estrangers, francament catalanòfil. Però cal destacar, sobretot, que el president de la Comissió Organitzadora va ser l’occità, abnegat amic de Catalunya, Peire Lois Berthaud, i que es va assolir la quantitat de gairebé quatre-centes obres rebudes, cent de les quals arribades de l’interior del país, fortament subjugat pel franquisme anticatalà. Retorn a l.Amèrica el 1949, amb una festa de considerable resonància a la ciutat de Montevideo. Encapçalava el Patronat d’Honor el President de la República de l’Uruguai Luis Batlle Benes, descendent de catalans.

Es mantenien les esperances del retorn a Barcelona, però mentrestant, el 1950, s’hi varen acostar tan com varen poder: a Perpinyà, la capital de la terra catalana del cantó francès. Dues anotacions importants en aquest cas: Pau Casals va presidir els Jocs i la gent de l’exili va poder remarcar que, de l’interior, hi participaven noms nous de gran vàlua, entre els quals el valencià Joan Fuster. Malgrat tantes persecucions i opressió tan forta, continuava ben viu l’esperit nacional! Certament, sorgien veus rellevants de totes les terres catalanes. A  la Catalunya que va passar a França –després de la guerra del 1659- es destaca la participació de Josep Sebastià Pons, mentre que a la del sud dels Pirineus  s’escau remarcar Esteve Albert, l’incansable activista i lligam eficaç entre l’interior i l’exili en la llarga nit de la dictadura franquista.

Els Jocs Florals de l’exili es varen iniciar coincidint amb la creació del Consell Nacional de Catalunya, dit de Londres, i en la primera fase fan camí plagats, en plena línea ascendent de representativitat col.lectiva. Remarquem que els Jocs de Bogotà es varen celebrar el dia 13 de maig de 1945, alhora que un mes abans, el 14 d’abril, la Delegació del Consell de Nova York, presentava el famós “The Case of Catalonia” a les Nacions Unides, signat per la gairebé totalitat dels catalans organitzats arreu. Era quan feien el ple les Comunitats Catalanes escampades per tot el Continent americà, exponent de la més gran unitat mai més assolida a la diáspora catalana, fora de les unanimitats meravelloses a l’entorn dels Jocs Florals.

Així arribem a l’any 1951, novament a l’Amèrica, ara a la ciutat de Nova York. La immensitat dels Estats Units i de la mateixa ciutat de Nova York presentaven un repte molt especial per a una col.lectivitat catalana poc nombrosa. Però tot i així varen aconseguir els nivells de qualitat habituals, amb un ressò apreciable als medis culturals als quals eren ben introduïts molts catalans. A la Comissió Organitzadora, com a president, el reputat pintor Joan Sunyer, amb l’arquitecte Josep Lluís Sert, Joan Casablancas i el dinàmic Jaume Miravitlles com a secretari. Hi hagué un acte d’obertura i presentació a l’Auditori del Museu d’Art Modern, l’endemà la Festa pròpiament dita al Paraninf de la Universitat, una visita solemne al Museu Romànic, on hi ha pedres catalanes venerables, i el dia següent, era un diumenge, el Sopar de Germanor habitual, que va ser al Waldorf Astoria...

Arribaven temps de fer balanç i ho va registrar H. Nadal i Mallol a la seva revista “Ressorgiment”. Els autors de la iniciativa, deu anys abans, recorda, segurament no podien creure que hagués de tenir tanta importància.  I constata: els Jocs Florals de la Llengua Catalana signifiquen la unitat efectiva de tots els catalans. És a l’Editoral del número de desembre de 1951. Els catalans, tan dificils d’arribar a grans acords en matèries com és ara l’economia o la política, fan pinya i són capaços de creacions admirables amb l’idioma propi i amb la cultura. A la mateixa revista, el mes de setembre anterior, Miquel Ferrer -probablement el català més actiu, en iniciatives de correspondència i escrits, durant tot l’exili- signa una reflexió adient: “El valor polític dels Jocs Florals a l’exili”. Certament, política nacional. Sentiment polític nacional, profund i perdurable. Des del més alt concepte de la vida col.lectiva i de presència al món.

Victor Castells

“JOCS  FLORALS” OF THE CATALAN LANGUAGE (1941-1951)
(continued)

           The Jocs Florals in exile had the collective will of a Catalan national affirmation both in origin and as a main component in the countries that welcomed them. At the same time they were reinforced by a clear antifrancoist  feeling that made them specially attractive to the western political  and intellectual centers. If one adds here the creative enthusiasm of the important and numerous exiled writers, it is easier to understand the great success the games had everywhere, both in America and in Europe.
          In 1945 the Jocs were organized in Colombia. There was a small number of Catalans there Some of them were old residents and others were newcomers. They were, however, very active and well qualified, and did a brilliant presentation in the Teatro Colón. The Gobierno Nacional of Colombia had let them use the Teatro Colón. Without ever forgetting the canons of Catalanity that define the Festa, the Games were celebrated  with the attendance of many ministers, politicians and intellectuals of the country, some of them well known for their interest in the Catalan culture. There were special awards for works in Galician and in Basque. Among the Catalan authors who received awards we must point out Ramon Vinyes, who lived in Barranquilla. He was given everlasting fame as “el sabio catalán” in “Cien años de soledad” by Gabriel García Márquez. Josep M.Capdevila, chairman of the organizing group, remembered with emotion the one hundreth anniversary  of Jacint Verdaguer’s birth. And just an addendum: even though  republican Spaniards had attended the ceremony, later on the outstanding Catalan feeling  the act had  caused provoked a strong anti-Catalan reaction that was led by a man who had been a member of  Negrín’s government in Spain during the civil war.
          The end of World War II brought moments of euphoria. It was even thougt that the Floral Games could be brought back to Barcelona. But it did not happen that way.They were celebrated, however, close to it, in Occitan land. In May, 1947, they were held in the Theater of the Opera of Montpellier. It was a great feast of Occitan- Catalan  brotherhood, with well known people participating in it, like Pompeu Fabra, Antoni Rovira i Virgili, Ventura Gassol, Joan Amade, Peire Azemar, Enric Guiter, young Heribert Barrera… And two personalities  that were going to be a most efficient support of the Games forever: Manuel Alcàntara i Gusart  who from Mexico, where he lived, opened the way to Montpellier, and Miquel Guinart, who lived in Montpellier. Both men coordinated the Feast in the years to follow. The number of written works sent to participate  went up  to be twice as many as it had been in the Havana Games, up to then the point of highest participation.
          It was not possible to go back to Barcelona. It appeared that the Jocs Florals would remain in Europe.. In 1947 they were  organized in London, with Mercè Rodoreda  as winner of the Flor Natural. In 1948  in Paris, in the Sorbonne, with a literary excellence very hard to superate in the Catalan world, because of the exceptional concentration of famous names. The attendance of French personalities was also interesting,  with Ybon Delbos, presently minister of Education, past minister of Foreign Affairs during the Civil War and a declared Catalanophile. The president of the Organizing Commission this time was Peire Lois Berthaud, an Occitan very good friend of Catalonia. Four  hundred works were received to compete that year.  One hundred of those workd came from Catalonia, strongly dominated by anti-Catalan Francoism. In 1949 the Jocs went back to America, with a good Feast in the city of Montevideo. The first name  of the Honor Board was Luis Batlle Benes, President of the Republic of Uruguay, whose ancestors were Catalan. 
          The hope of going back to Barcelona was always there. In 1950 they were a little nearer: they were in Perpinyà, capital of the Catalan Land on the French side. Two important points in this case: Pau Casals presided the Games, and the exiled people saw  several well known people from inside Spain  participating, among them the Valencian writer Joan Fuster. In spite of so many persecutions and of so much oppression, the national spirit was very much alive. In the Catalonia that had been made a part of France – after the 1659 war – the participation of Josep Sebastià Pons  must be mentioned, and from Catalonia south of the Pyrenees we have Esteve Albert, untiring activist and a strong bond between the people at home and the exiles in the long night of the Francoist dictatorship. 
	The first Jocs Florals in exile coincided with the creation of  the National Council of Catalonia, (called of London), and at the beginning both entities advanced together, following an upward line of collective representation. It should also be noted that the Bogota Jocs were held on May 13th, 1945, and that just a month before that, on April  14th ,  the Delegation of the Council in New York presented the famous “Case of Catalonia” in the United Nations, a document signed  by practically all the Catalans  that belonged to different organizations. That happened when the Catalan Communities that spread  throughout the American Continent were flourishing, showing the strongest unity ever achieved in the Catalan diaspora, excepting the wonderful unanimity for the Jocs Florals.
          And so we reach 1951, again in America, now in the city of New York. The vastness of the United States and of the city of New York itself presented a very special challenge for a small Catalan collectivity. They achieved, however, the usual level of quality, with a considerable appreciation in the cultural centers  where many Catalans were very active. The Organization Board  was presided by the famous painter Joan Sunyer. With him were architect Josep Lluís Sert, the nationalist fighters Josep Fontanals and Joan Agell, the sculptor Joan C. Broch, and Joan Casablancas. The secretary was the dynamic Jaume Miravitlles. There was an opening ceremony in the auditorium of the Museum of Modern Art and, on the following day, the Feast itself in the central hall of New York University, an emotive visit to the Romanic museum, where there are venerable Catalan stones, and in the following day, a Sunday, the usual Brotherhood Dinner that took place in the Waldorf Astoria.
          It was the moment to make a balance of what had happened , and so it was done by H. Nadal i Mallol in his journal “Ressorgiment”. He mentions there that those that had begun that happening  ten years before probably did not imagine that it would become so important. He asserts that the Jocs Florals of the Catalan Language represent the effective unity of all Catalans. This appears in the Editorial of the edition of December 1951. The Catalans, so difficult to agree on economic or political matters,  did get together and achieve  wonderful creations with their language and culture. In the previous month of September Miquel Ferrer, who probably was the most active Catalan  in exile, both in ideas and in written works, published an essay in the same magazine. The title of his work was “The political value of the Jocs Florals in exile”. National politics, certainly. A national political feeling, deep and everlasting. And coming from the highest concept of collective life and presence in the world.

                                                                                                         Victor Castells                                                                                               

   

From El Periódico de Catalunya

                                              PAPERS AND VOTES

The history of the documents of Catalonia that are now in the Archives of Salamanca is an example of the arrogance of power:  yes, these are your papers, but I  do not want to give them back to you. And in order not to do it, they invent arguments as the minister Pilar del Castillo has done: “The history of Spain shall not be fragmented” 
          My goodness: Does she need to be taught something  so elementary as the fact that the history of Spain  - or any other history – is not just papers? History means facts done by diverse people – in Spain by Visigoths, Romans, Castilians, Aragonese, Catalans, Arabs… and the papers only documented those facts.
          It is also frivolous to speak of  “the unity and the cohesion” of Spain, as if giving back the stolen papers meant the collapse of the State. And when it is said in Salamanca that the Catalan papers had to remain there because of “the right of conquest”, don’t they see that this is justifying the cohesion of Spain through the power of guns instead of defending it through a peaceful and permanent respect towards every one’s rights?
          Even Fraga himself proposed, some time ago, a decret to begin the restitution. Nothing was done but at least the facts were acknowledged, as well as the assertion that a rightful and democratic State should begin to rectify all kinds of plundering. The Aznar administration has hardened  itself in its obstinacy, and minister Piqué has the nerve to accuse the Generalitat of an “intentional confrontation”. It is  as if somebody heavily in debt and unwilling to pay were to accuse the person who wants to be payed  of being guilty of demanding what is his due.
          If we want to keep a paper belonging to someone else we can ask “May I  make a copy of it?”. Today it is very easy, we can make copies of everything.
           Hispanist historians affirm that the return of the original papers is right. I think that a day will come when a European order will make the papers to be given back  to their legitimate owners. It seems absurd for Aznar to prolong a conflictive situation.  But one may understand it keeping two things in mind: his growing personal toughness and,  also, a nationalism that may give him the papers he really wants: the ballots.

    Josep M. Espinàs

RANCID SPAIN IS NOT LISTENING

          It has lately been fashionable to say that the objectives planned  by the Catalanist project one hundred years ago have been attained and surpassed. After the 1898 crisis,  Catalanism was born as a project to achieve a radical change in Spain. Only if Spain were to oppose modernization Catalanism would think of secession. That is to say, they would only adopt the “Farewell; Spain”- the end of Joan Maragall’s “Ode to Spain”- if after a deep change had been proposed it were clear that Spain was not willing to listen.
          If the objective of Catalanism had been to modernize Spain and Spain is now a modern country, the objective would have been achieved. Catalanism would have accomplished its project. In a way, this was the underlaying debate in the discussions  that were often held some months ago about the economic strengh of Barcelona and Madrid. If  Madrid has already reached the level of Catalonia’s  economic dynamism, if Spain is already a fully European, industrial, and commercial country, Catalanism would be exhausted. Even more, if Madrid surpasses Barcelona in modernity, it could be said that Catalanism, after being the force behind the change, could be now cnsidered to be a dead weight.
          Personally, I think that this death certificate of the Catalanism transforming project is, at the very least, premature. The proposal of modernizing Spain, of radically transforming the concept of Spain, was not only an economic proposal. Catalanism wanted to change Spain in two ways. It wanted to turn Spain into an efficient, industrial, European State. It wanted, therefore, to change the economic reality of Spain. But it also wanted to change Spain in the cultural and symbolic fields. It wanted a Spain of linguistic plurality, of cultural diversity, of symbolic variety. And the redistribution of political power had to be valid for both projects, for the economic and for the cultural changes.
           Catalanism has been successful, in a way, in the economic modernization of Spain. However, some of the economic advantages that Madrid may have now are not due to the redistribution of political power that Catalanism was asking for. In fact, they are due  to the scarce redistribution, to the fact that under the disguise of the autonomic map a centralized model was still alive.
          Catalanism has not been successful in its project of reforming Spain in symbolic, cultural, and linguistic matters. Economic Spain may be now more or less modern. But in the symbolic field rancid Spain surfaces again, if it had ever been submerged. This is the Spain that was confronted by Catalanism more than one hundred years ago. One does not need to search very hard to find these rancid symbols. They can easily be seen in Eurovision or in the World Soccer Games and their respective commentators.
         At some point, in the transition, it seemed that there also existed the project to modernize the symbolic idea of Spain. It seemed to exist a project to create an idea of Spain with some sensibility towards plurality and internal diversity. But in the following years this tendency to modernization seems to have lapsed. Some people will say that it is the outcome of a political majority. I am not sure that this is true. Sometimes I have a contrary sensation. That is to say, the political majority  may not be the cause , it may be the effect of that reaffirmation of the old uniform Spanishness. A reaffirmation that exists not only in the political field but also in the cultural and the media fields, in which sometimes diverse and even opposed ideological sectors participate.
          It does not appear, therefore, that the Catalanist project has died because of success, because all of its objectives have been reached. Some of those objectives may have been achieved. But there is still a lot of work to be done on others. If the idea was that instead of old-fashioned  Spain we would have a pluricultural, plurilinguistic, and plurinational State, with a symbolic system to show this diversity not only in Barcelona but also in Madrid, we have not advanced as much and, in some points, we have even gone backwards in the last years.
          In fact, the most wide and transversal project of Catalanism is still today a cultural and symbolic project that hopes to influence both concepts and mentalities. In this aspect the old “Farewell, Spain” is still in force. And rancid Spain is not listening.

Vicenç Villatoro

From AVUI

DE  CUENCA

          The speech of Luis Alberto de Cuenca, Secretary of State of Culture, in the summer courses of the Complutense University, were indubitably a provocation, and not a gratuitous one.
         And, by the way, what kind of work does a Secretary of State of Culture in a State that has transferred all cultural matters to the autonomies? How does he spend the hours of his working time  all of us pay  him with rigorous punctuality?  What is his professional work?
          According to  newspapers this public official said  we must fight to death to defend our culture in front of the cultures of the immigrants, and we must not allow in any way that those cultures, different from our own culture, may dominate in any field and in any sense.
          The mental mechanisms used to say that one is thinking of killing to impose his culture – or his language, or his religion -  are exactly the same as those used to say that one thinks of dying for the same objectives. To kill or to die, even though the words seem to be a contradiction, are factors that answer to fanaticism, to an inner feeling of superiority – racial, cultural…- and to a denial of any kind of transaction, of dialogue and, of course, of cultural exchange.
         How a Spaniard, coming from I do not know where in the State,  can he reach these delusions of grandeur when, in any case, he is the result of a mixing of cultures? Even more, is it possible for a public official to make these aberrant declarations without being reproved? The enormous historical ignorance shown by this fanatic, can  it  be accepted from somebody  who works  in a ministry of Culture and speaks in a university?
           I suspect, however, that the people now in power  in Spain are getting the population used to  racist language. Beginning with Aznar and then in a chain of obedience that seems militarized, and in a way that can be more or less subtle, more or less periodical, we are hearing a discourse that is pure and simple xenophobia. The loudspeakers of power spread this kind of things, the citizen who was trying to educate his own tribal tendency of hate towards  foreigners feels grateful and comforted. And so, in the twinkling of an eye, the bases for a neofascism are set.
          However, let me ask you a question. Can you imagine what would happen if a Catalan had pronounced the same sentence about  Catalan culture? 
 
Isabel-Clara Simó

WHAT  IS  LEFT  OF  THE  CIVIL WAR?

           The Spaniards who lived that terrible 18th of July 1936 when they were around 20 years old are now in their 80s. Twenty years is an age in which understanding facts and participating in them can go together. There are not very many witnesses of the beginning of the Civil War which, according to Santos Julià, “is the central fact of the history of Spain of the XXth century.
          If generationally the distance between ourselves and the Civil War is unavoidably growing, the Spain of today is materially and socially very far from the Spain of 1936. In spite of the persistence of  some important underdevelopment and instability, today with a ratio of human development in position number 21 among 162 States and with a level of technological development in the 19th  place, Spain shares the prosperity and the problems of a developed country with its European environs.  To look back to those facts after more than sixty-five years, at the beginning of the XXIst  century only makes sense in the area of confronted ideas and principles, of the interpretation of causes, responsibilities and consequences of the Civil War.
          In the ideological system of those who won the war there was a sanctified fatherland and ultramontane Catholicism, national-syndicalism and autarchy, familiar and social hierarchism, interventionism in the economy and in labor relations, controlled culture  and censorship… All this has disappeared now, it is not relevant  even in the museum of history and it does not move even the nostalgic ones.
          In the ideological system of those who lost the war there was a social and representative democracy, public freedoms and social equality, republicanism and laicism, land reform and mutual association, creative and liberating culture… Some of it has succeeded and some has been left aside because society’s modernization has followed other lines. The possible superiority of this system has never been able to be proved.
          The causes of the Civil War and the discussion about who was responsible for it  have been often studied and are the subject of a debate that makes its appearance every now and then. It happened, for instance, in September 1999, when the Popular Party was the only one that refused to condemn the military uprising of 1936, and repeated refusal and solitude in February 2000. It happened, too, when in December 1999 and April 2000  the ecclesiastical hierarchy refused to acknowledge its abetting implication in the war and its support of Franco.
          The theory that the war was unavoidable or needed to solve the confrontation of the supposed two Spains, does not stand a rigorous analysis. According to Julián Marias, “Its origin was not the objective situation of Spain, but its interpretation”. According to Santos Julià: “In fact the Civil War was not the unavoidable result of the situation of the Spanish Republic in 1936; it was the direct consequence of a military coup d’état.”  20 per cent of the military officers were loyal and defended the Republic, and many of them were later executed by the rebels. And the fact is that without the seditious uprising of most of the army officers the Civil War would not have happened. This is an opinion shared by most historians and is difficult to deny. According to Azaña: “Even if all the disasters that were blamed on the Republic had been true, the war was not needed. It was useless to remedy those wrongs, it made them worse, adding to them the results of so  much destruction”   
          Historical truth and moral requirements do not let us place both sides on the same level  and make us refuse the equidistance – equal responsibility, equal sacrifice – as unfair and false. According to Vicenç Navarro: “To place the winners and the defeated in the same moral level shows insensibility towards democracy”.
          Unluckily the war did not end in April 1st 1939 as Franco’s war communiqué pretended. For the next thirsty-six years Francoism extended the Civil War through other means: purges, repression, oppression both economic and in the field of the nationalities and languages. All of that did slowly change and tried to fit in the social transformation at home and in the international context.
          Deliberately, the dictatorship made impossible the peace announced by its dithyrambic and fallacious propaganda. Then, after the death of the dictator, as Secundino Serrano says: “ The memory of the Civil War went through as an articulating element among ideologies, politicians, and citizens, and the never more acted as a powerful and obsessive factor of stabilization. Beginning in 1975, a pact to forget appeared simultaneously with the memory of the Civil War, and this pact buried the memory of the war as well as the memory of Francoism.”
          To that  “forgetfulness” one must add  the accumulative ignorance of the new generations. In fact,  the thing is not that they are unwilling to remember, the thing is that they do not now and, even worse, they do not want to know.
          The 1978 Constitution exalted democracy and liberties, and the possibility at last of a “territorial peace” through a State organization that recognizes a fundamental autonomy for the nationalities and regions, an autonomy where the majority of Spaniards felt comfortable and protected in their specific  collective identity. . Only ETA, that murders, wounds, extorts, practices terrorist vandalism on the streets and manipulates symbols, words, and history, only ETA is the last live coal of the Civil War. When ETA will have dissappeared, nothing will be left of the violence  and irrationality that  originated  in the year 1936.

Jordi Garcia-Petit

                                            

SALAMANCA
   
       We come into the world – no, in fact we are brought to it, or even worse, we are thrown in it – for a simple question of papers. To receive some of them, to be deprived of some others, or to have a bundle stolen from us. It depends. In a way it is like Hamlet’s dilemma with three possibilities, that is to say in a more modest range: groundfloor and first and second floors. I see it this way: the furies, fates, and guardian angels all together in a seraphic coral mass, the assembly of the anathemas, order the new born: “You, stranger,  will be a baker”, and so will he be. But then they say: “You will not be a baker, you will be a shoemaker”. And then: You will not be either a baker or a shoemaker, you will be the president of the government”. And so is the outcome.
          This mechanism of destiny functions in this simple and understandable way. Because papers are everything. A person has no importance if, for instance, the cellulose is not present through bureaucracy, in the composition/decomposition of his/her blood. Present or absent, nobody is anybody wiithout being listed  among the quivering candidates to exist. The outcome will always depend on the final inclusion or exclusion. Obviously all this happens to people, but also to things, to everything that  beats, swells, and has volume and time to use up: substantives, common and proper nouns, organisms, rivers, and cities. Woe to everything having organic or inorganic life without having a paper to hold on anywhere or to be proved to himself . This undivided subject is already aware of its early end.
          This, however, is not exactly the case. The case is that my grandfather, on my mother’s side, was a great man called Marius, which is also my name. He was a learned man, very cultured and educated. And he was a romantic, too. He had a big library that I – who was then from six to eleven years old – stirred and devastated with my hunger for knowledge. One of the books that I avidly gobbled up – with the enthusiastic approval of my grandfather- was the collection of poetic works by José Espronceda. Through those pages, and most of all through the calle del Ataúd I got to know Don Félix de Montemar. That is to say El estudiante de Salamanca. Here one finds those very famous verses: :”Hojas del árbol caídas / juguete del viento son,/ las ilusiones perdidas / ¡ay! son hojas desprendidas / del árbol del corazón.”
          And, of course, I quickly and violently became a friend of Don Félix and a friend of Salamanca, with its narrow, misty, and charming streets. A misterious city that never again would be either indifferent or unknown to me.  Partly because of the “inocente y desdichada Elvira” and partly because of the vision, more real today, of a  night when “el diablo a Salamanca / había, en fin, por Montemar  venido”.
           Because who says Montemar – the Salamancan Don Juan Tenorio – says things that are at the same time more concrete and more changeable, more disturbing. Like the papers, for instance. The stolen papers. The papers stolen during a long night of war.
          Poor Elvira – afterwards Teresa-  Poor Salamanca  ¡Poor Don Félix  and poor devil! I am not anymore a young reader discovering the world. I am, like the one in EL DIABLO MUNDO, “un hombre ya caduco, y cuento atento / del cansado reloj el golpe lento”
           And that is why I smile. But I am still able – and today more than ever – to separate the wheat from the chaff, and the red poppy from the weeds. Without needing to aspire to reach the excellence of a Faust (“el Adán de Espronceda”) simply to remain in my place, a place always illtreated, I cry for this Salamanca that has become hateful  through politicians on duty, people who are not at all poetic and are even more diabolical than prosaic. In some proportion, they are the reminiscence of the “los nacionales”, still to be purged.
         In any case, as people say today, be easy: we will die democratically. Besides, so many years  have gone by that one more does not matter. Perhaps it is not the moment. And, too, there are all kinds  of paper : untrimmed paper, brown paper, carbon paper, sand paper, and most of all tracing paper. And among so many textures and categories, which one would correspond to Salamanca, a city that yesterday was the nest of romantic ghosts and today is the nest of winners, guardians of  “la unidad”?
          Because, in fact, it is a phantasmagoric atmosphere the one surrounding all this regrettable affair that affects us. Because the truth is that  Castilians do not give a damn for the papers. Their only obsession, as always, is to dominate. To humiliate Catalonia - and so to separate her in some hypothetical aspect – is their dream of a night of war. May Salamanca have el estudiante walking through the city, feeling at home, and may El Diablo Mundo, with all his power, intercede on the city’s behalf.
                                                                                     Màrius Sampere i Passarell
From ELTEMPS
  
NATIONS, NATIONALISTS

          Too many speeches and papers sharing the idea of an inherent evil existing in any nationalism have been in circulation for many years. This implies a curious negative mental position about the national fact itself, as if it were some kind of mankind’s measles, a historical misfortune, a plague, and in any case an archaism that must be exterminated. A curious ideology, often trying to appear as being progressive or liberal while being unaware of the fact that human societies have been organizing progress and freedom for many years inside spaces that they call nations. It seems to be unaware, too, of the fact that people not owning that space, or owning  it in an unsuitable and insatisfying way, would find it difficult to feel at ease among so many others that do fully own it.
          Because to affirm that “living as a nation” is the form and the frame that define modern life in society is not a “nationalism” of a dangerous species, it is not an ideological position: it is only a verification . Therefore to think that the “topic of the nation” is something archaic and surpassed, without either a practical or a theoretical interest, or to think that it is the source of all wrongs,  is simply equivalent to going sailing through a world of volatile and weightless ideas. Or to be thinking with a very biased bad faith, even though it be disguised as constitutional liberalism.
          To ignore or to scorn certain aspects and dimensions of reality when this reality does not fit into previous conceptual models, is an old mental habit that comes already from Plato, goes through Marx, and reaches the sociologists of the Frankfurt  school and the economists of the Chicago school.  On the other hand, it is interesting that a more or less Marxist socialism and a more or less  democratic liberalism, the two grand ideologies  considered as being “modern”, pretend to be ideologies of economic rationality. Or, even more, ideologies accepting that all may be reduced to the economist model, be it either marketing or planning.
          Applying the same method and model, the economy – production, capital, and marketing on a continental and planetary scale – would show that nations do not  “make any sense” or have any space in the future and even less, alas, the small nations. And neither will they find a cultural or political space because of the effects of that global economy, which are the planetary unification of consumption and behavior – all of us drink coca-cola, or dance rock, or whatever – and because of the unification of the centers of power, which could be the multi-national companies, the European Union, or the IMF.
          However, this is not so. The nations are not private folkloric constructions that may be dismantled and replaced by a universal folklore. Neither are they groups of handicraft workshops that will be cancelled by Microsoft or General Motors, or simple structures of local power that will disappear in front of Wall Street or of the Brussels’ eurocrats. They are something else. They are the particular habitat of modern societies inside a shared universal habitat, which is exactly to say the modern form to inhabit the world,  and this is unavoidable.
          At least it will be so until another way to be in the world be invented to take its place, as long as it be equally universal. However, I do not see anywhere any indication of a forthcoming appearance of identity areas that would be equivalent to and substitutes for the areas that are now perceived as being national; there may be some complementary ones, but none that is either substitute or equivalent of those now existing. For all of us, a different consideration is to be or not to be comfortable, restful and peaceful in the nation or piece of a nation that we have got. And that our map, border, and state be a stable or unstable space, made or half-made, peaceful or conflictive. I suppose that those who have a nation in peace are happier – at least there is one problem they do not have – but perhaps this happiness has not been part of our lot. We still have the duty, or the passion, to go on looking for it.
          And if, because of this modest and most human aspiration, we have to assume  to be qualified as “nationalists” – as a reproof that associates us to the worst kind of people- we will live through it by alternately practicing the understandable vice of anger and the universal virtue of patience. 

                                                                                                           Joan F. Mira

 DID
	YOU
		KNOW
			THAT? ….

***  Mr. Victor Castells, who generously gives us part of his very busy time writing the articles for Catalonia Today, has written several books, all of them with clear political ideas and showing a deep knowledge both of the history and the politics of and in Catalonia. This year he has published  Nacionalisme Català i Guerra Civil a Catalunya (1936-1939)  A review of the book, signed by Manfred Díez i García in “Relleu”, says that in this book Víctor Castells wants the reader to put aside the usual version of the Civil War according to which the war was a confrontation between right and left political points of view. The reviewer says that the author analizes the conflict  as part of the fight against Castile in which Catalonia has been immersed for years in order to achieve full freedom and sovereignty.

***  The CATALONIA AWARD has been given this year to the well known critic Mr. Harold Bloom. In an interview published in AVUI, Mr. Bloom shows a very deep knowledge of Catalan literature, both poetry and prose. He says: “My interest for Catalan literature began with the study of Provençal, although of course this is not the same language. ...If we keep in mind that there are today some nine million Catalan speakers, the quantity and riches of Catalan literature is outstanding, in spite of the long Francoist period”

***  The Exhibition Hall Joan Saqués in Girona presented last September the XIII Biennal Show of Catalan Contemporary Art 2002 with works of thirsty young artists from Catalonia and Andorra. This is an itinerant show that takes selected art works to several cities. Some of the selected artists came from different parts of Girona, like Joaquim Cantalozella from la Selva, Xavier Escribà from Alt Empordà, and Laura Morejon from la Garrotxa.

*** Josep Massot has published “Aspectes de la guerra civil a les Illes Balears”. The volume contains several essays, some of them new and others that had already been published elsewhere. All of them deal with diverse aspects of the war. Massot studies in depth the fields and personalities that have interested him for years. Some of them are the bishop Miralles, the writer Bernanos, the politician Antoni M. Sbert, and subjects like the Italian presence in Mallorca and the cultural situation in that island during the first years of Francoism.