Ghosts of Spain: Travels Through a Country's Hidden Past

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A reader with a better understanding of what drives people apart and makes federalism so elusive in a place like Spain, or what makes Galicians seem so inscrutable and full of ironic subtlety in their silence will find more insight in what the author uncovers in his travels than the author shows himself.

Ghosts of Spain : Travels Through Spain and Its Silent Past

Ghosts of Spain" is a warts-and-all love letter from someone who hopes never to recover from the "coup de foudre,"" -- "Sunday Times" (London) "Tremlett, Madrid correspondent for the Guardian, went native almost immediately upon his arrival in Spain twenty years ago. Despite the passing of time, they have never forgotten what happened and that has been passed down through the generations. The premise of the book is that there is a story to be told around the secret histories of people who have simply refused to talk about their experiences under Franco. I know someone whose uncle was denounced then taken out and shot because a neighbour wanted his bicycle.It is no mean feat to spend nearly 400 pages talking about the silence of Spain, much of that spent talking about and openly showing partisanship in various disputes where the author demonstrates himself to be a leftist who is committed to globalism and deeply ambivalent about his own identity and legacy as an Englishman. This helps to make sense of the country as there are many things that can confuse you while you’re living there. This was built on what I had encountered during previous trips to the country and stereotypes of Spain. My main expectation was a focus on the Spanish Civil War until present, but that was just the first chapter. It might have proved a more rewarding read had some of Tremlett's own 'ghosts' been given a part to play in his exploration.

Ghosts of Spain: Travels Through Spain and Its Silent Past

But different political parties propose competing interpretations of the past, which of course reflect their different interpretations of the present.The intensity of the internal debate in 2004 in the wake of the jihadi Madrid train bombings was also well-described, with the surprising (to me) initial focus of suspicion on the Basque separatists, ETA. You will never read a Spanish account of such encounters, though prostitutes' ads fill pages in the posh papers. Tremlett hits his stride, though, in his retelling of the events surrounding the Madrid train bombings in March 2004. I cant vouch for it's accuracy but it certainly appears that the author has 'gotten under the skin of Spain' and is offering the reader some very interesting insights into one of Europe's largest countries.