"The best Spanish novel about the Spanish Civil War." — Álvaro Mutis, Author, The Adventures and Misadventures of Maqroll, winner of the Neustadt International Prize for Literature
 Winner of Spain's prestigious Planeta Prize for fiction, this historical novel takes the form of an imagined diary by General Antonio Escobar, the highest-ranking officer of the Republican Army remaining in Spain at the end of the Spanish Civil War, while he awaited trial and execution.
 Besides being a vivid reminder of how destructive political passions can be, General Escobar's War is also a profoundly intimate portrait of an inspiring man. By his decisive action on July 19, 1936, Escobar, then a Civil Guard colonel and a man of profound religious conviction, succeeded in thwarting the military uprising in Barcelona.
 Although his father was a hero of the Spanish-American War in Cuba, his daughter was a nun, and one of his sons was a Falangist fighter, Escobar freely chose to defend the Republic in accordance with his oath to support the legally constituted government.
 The author gives a rare perspective of the Spanish Civil War, free of partisanship and ideology, through a soldier who, in Spain's great historic schism, chose to take a deeply uncomfortable stance because he believed his duty called him to do so.
"A wonderful book that explores the experience of a brave and honorable soldier, a faithful Catholic. His true story, here fluently translated, is told with moving sensitivity and an admirable lightness of touch." -- Lucy Beckett, Author, Postcard from the Volcano, and winner of the Aquinas Award for Fiction

General Escobar's War: A Novel of the Spanish Civil War

Literature & Fiction

José Luis Olaizola

Genre Fiction

Ignatius Press

Durante diez años Álvar Núñez Cabeza de Vaca recorrió a pie el extenso territorio que va desde Río Bravo hasta El Paso, atravesando Texas y los estados mexicanos de Chihuahua y Sonora.Había llegado en 1527 en una poderosa escuadra compuesta por cinco navíos y seiscientos hombres dispuestos a conquistar la Tierra Firme, situada en La Florida, que se suponía encerraba enormes tesoros de oro y plata. Pero pronto esa escuadra fue desbaratada por los temporales, las deserciones, las enfermedades, la ferocidad combativa de los nativos. . . Al cabo de un tiempo sólo quedaron cuatro expedicionarios, uno de ellos él, convencido de actuar como vicario del Emperador Carlos V para tomar posesión de aquellas tierras y predicar a los paganos el Evangelio.Una epopeya difícil de imaginar en la actualidad.

A la conquista de los apaches

History

LIBROSLIBRES

This frequently reprinted bestseller provoked strong reactions when it was first published eight years after Franco's death. Himself a leading Spanish catholic thinker coming to terms with a permissive socialist society, Olaizola here explores the paradox of General Escobar - a Civil Guard and Franciscan tertiary who joined with communists and anarchists to defend the Republic against Franco's "catholic" crusade. Winner of the prestigious Planeta Prize, "La Guerra del General Escobar" is the fictional diary of the General as he awaits the death sentence in Barcelona. He reviews his experience of the civil war, the divided loyalties within his own family and the divisions that threatened to destroy the Republic. Unknown to Olaizola, the General had indeed kept a prison diary. In her critical introduction, Rosemary Clark discusses, among other things, how its remarkable similarities to the fictional diary add authority to Olaizola's exploration of the deeper significance of the Spanish Cicil War.

La guerra del general Escobar: Novela (Colección Autores españoles e hispanoamericanos) (Spanish Edition)

Education & Teaching

Schools & Teaching

Planeta

Planicio

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Books by José Luis Olaizola