El pasajero de Montauban / The Passenger from Montauban
Travel , 2003
Galaxia Gutenberg
Pages: 199
With his characteristic brilliant style, José María Ridao traverses in this travel book not only a geography, but also the history of Spain and the ideas and ideologies that underlie and clash in its recent political history. The title pays homage to Manuel Azaña, President of the Second Spanish Republic, who died in exile in the small French city of Montauban. Ridao reveals in these literary journeys how the Castilianist vision of Spain forged by the most illustrious authors of the Generation of '98 is offensive to the rest of the Spanish regions, and how its romantic idealism was resistant to development. The Passenger from Montauban is a lucid stance that confronts, through words, the conservatism of yesteryear and today's lightness and banality.