Angles on Otherness in Post-Franco Spain: The Fiction of Cristina Fernández-Cubas (review)

Arizona fournal of Hispanic Cultural Studies 291 rating the lives and commitment of the few remaining veterans of the Lincoln Battalion. A coffee table style book featuring full-page black and white photos and text (both in Spanish and English), Passing the Torch is an informative and compelling conversation piece. It begins with a brief forward by Eduardo Galeano stressing the main thread of the project: that the US veterans of the Spanish Civil War did not stop fighting for freedom and self-determination after the end of the Spanish conflict—hence the words "legacy of hope" in the subtitle. Geist and Moreno then offer their respective assessments of the project, the conception, genesis, and intentions as well as a cursory introduction to the causes and development of the War itself. The body of the work is divided into four sections: I) biographical and pictorial sketches of seven brigadistas—Abe Osheroff, Elias "Dutch" Shultze, Bob Reed, Al Chisolm, Virginia Malbin, Bob Ingalls, and Brooke Carmichael—followed by separate segments devoted to that legacy: II) the Salvador Solidarity Movement, III) the antiGulf War I movement, and IV) the "Battle in Seattle," all of which hark back to the motivations of the brigadistas as they set out to Spain nearly sixty years ago to fight against fascism. The lives of all of the veterans featured in these photographic essays are more than remarkable . As youngsters they were involved in leftist political activity: some were in labor unions, others active in the US Communist Party, and some sought to escape the depression and the material hardship it had wreaked on so many Americans. The varying degrees of familiarity with Spanish culture and history on the part of the volunteers is also interesting. Al Chisolm, for example, an African -American who had gone to Spain as a reaction to the Italian fascist invasion of Ethiopia, says Spain gave him an opportunity to '"fight those Fascist bastards'" (85). Similarly, for Virginia Malbin, a social worker who took care of children who were victims of the war, submits that going to Spain "didn't take much courage, it just seemed die right thing to do" (105). Abe Osheroff was somewhat different from these in his long-time commitment to the Communist Party, and as such, was and remains deeply familiar with the historical underpinnings of the Spanish war, so much so that today he teaches university courses on this topic. Geists and Moreno's project continues with photographic portrayals of dissent over international conflicts that point to the progressive legacy of the Spanish anti-fascist war and the participation in it of US volunteers. These parallels are not clearly drawn in the short texts introducing these segments—there is no text for die anti World Trade Organization protest since it occurred dose to the book's publication date. But the precise comparisons are not the point of the book. Its creators— and I include the veterans—want readers and viewers to think about the possible connections between what they did and what is going on today and leave it at that. Indeed this book is, more than anything, a conversation piece. Today as our government continues to trudge into more unwarranted and destructive conflicts, arguably to protect the interests of oil corporations and international elites based in the US, the brigadisras' example both clarifies and renders complex the question of political commitment . There is no denying diat die political realities of this new millennium would be unrecognizable to anyone who died in Spain from 1936 to 1939. It is significant—and worthy of lively conversation —that today's progressive voice is firmly anti-war, while in 1936 there was not much room for pacifism. Still, it is undeniable that the overarching motivations of the Lincoln veterans (social equality, human rights, self-determination) are vividly apparent today among those who cry out against what many (including this reviewer) see as imperialist wars waged by the US. Michael Ugarte University of Missouri-Columbia Angks on Otherness in Post-Franco Spain: The Fiction of Cristina Fernández-Cubas Bucknell University Press, 2002 By Jessica A. Folkart In her book Angles on Otherness in PostFranco Spain, Jessica A. Folkart analyzes...