Author | Hugh Thomas |
---|---|
Language | English |
Subject | Spanish Civil War |
Published | 1961 |
Media type | |
Pages | xx, 1115 [3rd, revised ed.] |
ISBN | 0060142782 |
The Spanish Civil War is a book by British historian Hugh Thomas, first published in London by Eyre & Spottiswoode (xxix, 720 pages, illustrated with photos and maps). [1] It won the Somerset Maugham Prize in 1962. [2] A second revised edition was published by Penguin Books in 1965. [3] A third, revised and enlarged edition was published in 1977 by Harper & Row, [4] which was printed again in 2001 and 2013. [5] Thomas said that the excellent reviews the book got on its release were a determining factor in his own life and career. [6]
The book has been translated in various languages, among them Greek, French and Spanish.
Upon its release in 1961, John Murray called it "an exhaustive study, ably and conscientiously documented". [7] In 1963, Robert G. Colodny wrote a similarly positive review, praising in particular the vast amount of research material examined. [8]
Shortly after the death of Thomas, Pablo Guimón called it "a seminal book on the Spanish Civil War", "a highly influential work during the country's transition to democracy" and "a classic reference in the existing literature about the 1936–1939 period in Spanish history". [9] Paul Preston claimed that "it marked the first attempt at an objective general view" of the Civil War. [10]
Richard Baxell wrote that "it is by no means faultless; there are many errors of fact and judgement and Thomas has rightly been accused of occasionally valuing narrative style above factual accuracy." Baxell is also critical of the faulty depiction of International Brigaders in the first edition. [11]
In 2018 Saveriano Delgado Crux, a historian and librarian at the University of Salamanca, questioned the veracity of the book's account of the verbal confrontation that happened on 12 October 1936 between Miguel de Unamuno and General José Millán Astray at the University of Salamanca, during a conference celebrating the discovery of America. While not denying that a strong verbal exchange between Unamuno and Astray happened on that day, Delgado argues that Thomas's account about the event derives from a 1941 article by Luis Gabriel Portillo (who was not present at Salamanca) in the British magazine Horizon , which Thomas came across in an anthology while researching for the book. He questions the reliability of Portillo's article, comparing it to a "liturgical drama, where you have an angel and a devil confronting one another. What he wanted to do above all was symbolise evil—fascism, militarism, brutality—through Millán Astray, and set it against the democratic values of the republicans—liberalism and goodness—represented by Unamuno". [12] [13]
The book was forbidden in Francoist Spain. [14] The translation and the publication of the book was undertaken by Ruedo Ibérico , a publishing house in Paris founded by Spanish political refugees. It was targeted by Francoist authorities, and was the target of a terrorist attack by a pro-Franco group. [15] Copies were smuggled across the border with France, and Spaniards caught in possession of the book sometimes went to prison. For example a Valencian, Octavio Jordá, was caught at the French border with a pair of suitcases packed with many copies of the book. Jordá was later found guilty of "illegal propaganda" and "spreading communism" and sentenced to two years' imprisonment.
It was only after Francisco Franco’s death in 1975 that the book could be freely distributed in Spain. [16] [17]
In response to Thomas's book, Franco's then minister of information, Manuel Fraga, set up an official centre for civil war studies to promote the regime's official historiography. So successful was the book that even Franco was regularly asked to comment on statements in it. [18]
In 2016, the Spanish historian Guillermo Sanz Gallego argued that the Spanish translator, José Martinez, had manipulated his translation to follow an ideological pattern that favoured the Republican side. Moreover, the translation used less objective language than the original text in narrating events such as the assassinations of José Calvo Sotelo and Federico García Lorca. In the case of the Paracuellos massacres, the number of the deaths, several thousand in the original, was reduced to "approximately a thousand" (millar aproximado). [19] Sanz Gallego's claims attracted attention from the media. [20]
Miguel de Unamuno y Jugo was a Spanish essayist, novelist, poet, playwright, philosopher, professor of Greek and Classics, and later rector at the University of Salamanca.
Basilio Martín Patino was a Spanish film director, specializing in a creative approach to documentary works. Patino produced pieces on the Spanish Civil War, the famous dictator (Caudillo), or his executioners. He also produced fiction. Patino often experimented with new technologies, including digital tools, 3D, and offline editing.
José Millán-Astray y Terreros was a Spanish soldier, the founder and first commander of the Spanish Legion, and a major early figure of Francoist dictatorship.
Hugh Swynnerton Thomas, Baron Thomas of Swynnerton was an English historian and writer, best known for his book The Spanish Civil War.
Hispanidad is a Spanish term describing a shared cultural, linguistic, or political identity among speakers of the Spanish language or members of the Hispanic diaspora. The term can have various, different implications and meanings depending on the regional, socio-political, or cultural context in which it is used.
"Jarama Valley" also known as "El Valle del Jarama" is a song from the Second Spanish Republic. Referring to the Spanish Civil War Battle of Jarama, the song uses the tune of Red River Valley.
Gabriel Jackson was an American Hispanist, historian and journalist. He was born in Mount Vernon, New York in 1921. After his retirement he lived in Barcelona, Spain.
La Ilustración Española y Americana was a weekly Spanish magazine that was published from 1869 to 1921 on the 8th, 15th, 22nd and 30th of every month. It was also published biweekly.
Enrique Gil Robles (1849–1908) was a Spanish law scholar and a Carlist theorist. In popular public discourse he is known mostly as father of José María Gil-Robles y Quiñones. In scholarly debate he is recognized principally as one of key ideologues of Traditionalism; some authors view him also as major representative of a theory of law known as iusnaturalismo.
Black Serenade is a 2001 Spanish slasher film directed and written by Pedro L. Barbero and Vicente J. Martín about a serial killer who, dressed with a tuno cape and a mask, kills underperforming university students.
While at War is a 2019 Spanish-Argentine historical drama film directed by Alejandro Amenábar. Set in 1936, during the Spanish Civil War, the plot tracks the plight of philosopher and writer Miguel de Unamuno in Salamanca, a city controlled by the Rebel faction.
Eduardo Ortega y Gasset (1882–1965) was a Spanish politician, journalist and lawyer.
Ismael Saz Campos is a Spanish historian, specialised in the study of Falangism, Francoist Spain and the Spanish-Italian relations during the Spanish Civil War. He is a professor at the University of Valencia.
The Eastern Army, also translated as the Army of the East, was a unit of the Spanish Republican Army that operated in the eastern part of Spain during the Spanish Civil War. Republican forces deployed on the Aragon front of the war initially came under the command structure of the unit. Later in the Civil War, the unit operated in Catalonia, defending the Republican defensive line along the Segre river.
The 25th Division was one of the divisions of the Spanish Republican Army that were organized during the Spanish Civil War on the basis of the Mixed Brigades. It participated in the battles of Huesca, Belchite, Teruel and Levante.
Francisco Señor Martín was a Spanish trade unionist.
The 29th Division was a military formation belonging to the Spanish Republican Army that fought during the Spanish Civil War. Originally created in 1937 from the militarization of the POUM militia column, it was dissolved and recreated again in early 1938, operating on the Extremadura front.
Severiano Martínez Anido was a Spanish general who served in a number of government posts in Spain during the Primo de Rivera and Francoist dictatorships. He became known for the violent repression of the labor movement in Barcelona during the years of pistolerismo.
Peace in War is a mid-size novel by Miguel de Unamuno. Having been written since the mid-1880s, it was published in 1897. The narrative is set mostly in Bilbao and surroundings during the Spanish civil war of 1872-1876, with particular focus on the siege of the city in 1874. The protagonists are mostly Bilbao dwellers, some of Carlist and some of Liberal political preferences. The plot revolves around the fate of Ignacio Iturriondo, a man in his early 20s, who volunteered to Carlist troops. The book was generally well received by the press and the critics, but it failed to make a major impact and was not re-published until 1923. Issued in Latin America in the 1910s, in the inter-war period the novel was translated into German and Czech, and afterwards into some other European languages.
La Guerra Civil española, del recién fallecido Hugh Thomas, no era como los españoles la leyeron. Pequeños flecos manipulados en la traducción por José Martínez, el editor de Ruedo Ibérico, enfatizaron algunos hechos y atenuaron otros con el fin de exponer un relato más propicio para los defensores de la II República.