All things Spanish

January 6th is the day that Spanish children receive their "Christmas" gifts from the three kings, Melchior, Caspar and Balthasar. Tonight there will be a parade known as "cabalgata". Candies are thrown by the kings to the children who have brought large paper bags with them.



As part of my continuing education in life extending into my retirement I have immersed myself for the past year in all things Spanish.

I have been struggling to learn to speak and read Spanish but not with a lot of success. I will hang in there.

Reading about Spain has been very enlightening and most enjoyable. I have just finished a novel by C.J. Sansom titled "Winter in Madrid". It was just published in 2008 and as it says on the dust jacket is "part thriller, part romance, and part historical drama". It takes place in Madrid in 1940 at the beginning of World War II in the Spain under Franco's rule. It was especially fascinating to me because it is of an era in my lifetime in a country of which I knew very little.

I have also read "Driving Over Lemons" which is a very funny account by Chris Stewart of an Englishman who bought a small sheep farm in a remote part of Andelusia in southern Spain. It is very reminscent of books by Peter Mayle and Frances Mayes.

A very helpful book in understanding contemporay Spain is "The New Spaniards" by John Hooper which I read last summer. I took a couple of months to wade through this book but it was worth it. I learned so much about the transition from a dictatorship to a democracy, about the church and the monarchy, about different regions of the country, about the press, the arts, and music, and yes, about the bullfight.

A new novel by Joanna Trollope titled "A Spanish Lover" is a love story and her description of the Spanish countryside and Spanish people is very well written.

"Spain In Mind" edited by Alice Leccese Powers is an anthology of writings by forty English and American writers. Fiction, nonfiction, and poetry by writers such as Lord Byron, Ernest Hemingway, Henry James, George Orwell. Calvin Trillin, and Edith Wharton. all about Spain, are included.

I am currently reading "Spanish Recognitions" by Mary Lee Settle, an 82 year old woman who drives alone across Spain providing historical detail and travel description along the way. This is another very helpful book to me in my quest to understand the Spanish people and their culture.

I am also slowly reading the classic "Don Quixote" by Miguel de Cervantes.

On my reading list:

"Death in the Afternoon" by Ernest Hemingway

"Kinky Gazpacho" by Lori Tharps

"It's Not About the Tapas" by Polly Evans

"Song of the Outcasts" by Robin Totton

Tomorrow in All Things Spanish Part Two I will talk about Spanish Food and Music and a little about my friend Miguel.