De Vasconia a Euskal Herria pasando por…
octubre 29, 2007 | Escribe un comentario
“¿Vasconia?” “¿Euskadi?” “¿Euskal Herria?”… “… quasi fascist tendencies..” “.. this magical but manufacturing land..”
[ .. ]
Paddy Woodworth cubrió el problema vasco para el Irish Times entre 1988 y 2002. Y publicó Dirty War, Clean Hands: ETA, the Gal and Spanish Democracy (Yale University, 2002). Acaba de publicar The Basque Country: A Cultural History, que FT comenta con evidente respeto.
● Las culturas vascas, en la encrucijada.
● Un monumento para intentar comprender el problema vasco
Financial Times, 27 octubre 2007
Lingua rancour
By David Gardner
A splendid study of the Basque people*s fierce pride in their language, their passion for gastronomy, and the roots of Eta*s violence. By David Gardner
The Basque Country: A Cultural History
by Paddy Woodworth
Signal Books £12, 256 pages
This shrewd and affectionate study of the Basque country begins with a precautionary discussion of what to call this magical but myth-manufacturing land. Paddy Woodworth knows its people well enough to know that all words are loaded.
Should it be, playfully, Basqueland, or Vascongadas, the Indian country imagined by sneering Spanish nationalists? What about the neo-antique Vasconia, a spurious nationalist retrieval, or Euskadi, a century-old neologism invented by Sabino Arana, the xenophobe founder of the mainstream Basque Nationalist Party?
Woodworth prefers Euskal Herria, literally *the people who speak Basque*, irrespective of territorial borders. A Basque is then an Euskaldun, someone who speaks the language.
The unique Basque language, Euskera, is at the heart of the culture. It has historically been weakened by divisions in a region where dialects differ from valley to valley. Euskera was marginalising itself before Franco*s attempt to liquidate it, a campaign that arguably stimulated its recovery through the Ikastola schools movement and the codifying of a universal (Batua) language.
Woodworth*s suggestion that fear of the language being extinguished gave a violent edge to Basque nationalism that the Catalans, more secure in their literary culture, did not have, seems essentially right. But Franco*s treatment of the *traitor provinces* as if they were occupied territory didn*t help. It was unsurprising to everyone * except the rest of Spain * that Basques did not vote for the constitution that launched Spanish democracy in 1978.
Woodworth previously published an acclaimed study of the death squads used against Eta, the violent separatist group, by the Socialist government in the 1980s. He brings out well the parochial sterility of the Eta milieu, and its transformation from the defensive nationalism of victims to victimisers with some quasi-fascist tendencies. He is equally aware that keeping this political anachronism in business requires the existence of an infinitely more powerful Spanish nationalism as a foil.
I differ from Woodworth in one respect. In both his books he suggests that government death-squad murders of innocents unconnected with Eta were the result of bungling and callous disregard for bystanders. I have my doubts. In 1981-1982, snatch squads picked up Basque people at random, subjected them to sensory deprivation and hallucinogenic drugs, then dumped them back where they had been seized. Randomness was the point and terror the message. The message to non-Eta members was *this can happen to any of you* * but the dirty war created a flow of Eta recruits.
The dark side of Basque politics is just part of this rich book, which reveals the author*s enjoyment of the *joyous sociability* of the packed Basque calendar of fiestas, and the Basque devotion to gastronomy, as in the old joke about the three questions of Basque existentialism: Where do we come from? Who are we? (and, most urgent) Where are we going for dinner?
The Basque Country is full of gems: the chapter on the writer Bernardo Atxaga; and, of course, Bilbao*s rebirth through the miracle of the luminous Guggenheim museum. Woodworth has a good eye for architecture and topography. Bilbao*s modernist airport, shimmering glass on elliptical arches, is *like the rib cage of a whale*. This is a splendid portrait of a bewitching land. One only hopes it will be translated into Spanish.
David Gardner is the FT*s chief leader writer.
[ .. ]
- Euskadi, en este Infierno.
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- maty: Microsiervos -> El Periodista Google [Viñeta de EL JUEVES]
- JP Quiñonero: Cristobal, En este caso, NO hay pretexto que valga: es un librito cortísimo. Apenas unas páginas. De una...
- JP Quiñonero: Mme. Marie, Usted, siempre tan generosa, aunque en exceso severa con algunos lectores, Q.-
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- Cristóbal: Q.- Ay. Como se va haciendo de larga la lista de títulos que se han de leer. Y como se amontanan los libros...
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- Robert: ¿Si Uribe habia matado al comandante Raul Reyes en un ataque aéreo dentro de Ecuador, porqué se lo daría a un...
- Wallenstein77: Quiño este gobierno, a mi modesto entender, ha tenido multiples guiños hacia ciertos gobiernos, como se...
- JP Quiñonero: Wallenstein, Amistades, amistades… tampoco está muy claro ni son muy visibles esas posibles...
- Wallenstein77: Buenas tardes a todos: Quiño esto demuestra lo que llevo escribiendo desde hace tiempo, que este gobierno...
- maty: PÚBLICO.es El PSOE apoya el modelo lingüístico catalán y no ve en peligro el castellano Para que conste.
- JP Quiñonero: Marie, ¡Qué canción tan bella, esa de Charles Trenet..! Gracias por recordarla, Q.-
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