Alumni Travel Reading: Spain and Portugal

Stanley G. Payne, historian of Spain, especially the 20th century, provides a largely chronological survey of Spanish history combined with a discussion of major themes and topics.

This is a highly respected history in which scholars provide chapters on the time periods in which they specialize.

Livermore was a prolific historian of Iberia, especially Portugal. This is a lighter history, combining chapters organized chronologically with thematic chapters on such aspects of the Portuguese world as cities and regions, architecture, birds, music and wine.

While not confined to the two cities, this book contains many short pieces, easy and enjoyable to read. The writers include Gabriel García Márquez and Barbara Kingsolver among others.

There are many traveler accounts of the Camino de Santiago. Art historian Conrad Rudolph provides a short, well written one that adds medieval history, art, and practical advice.

Robert Hughes’s book might be too long for some, but, besides covering the art and architecture, his area of expertise, Hughes provides an excellent explication of Barcelona’s history and culture.

A more succinct picture by Barcelona writer Manuel Vázquez Montalbán, heavier on politics and cultural nationalism.

Looks at the modernization of Barcelona in the wake of the Olympics.

A novel which takes place in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

This novel is about an exile’s return to the city.

A book set in the postwar city.

A widely praised novel set in medieval Barcelona.

No fictional detective has covered Barcelona more intensively or chronicled modern Spain more thoroughly than Manuel Vázquez Montalbán’s sophisticated gastronome Pepe Carvalho. The 15 or so novels (most translated to English) feature food, sex, and politics. The author himself was a journalist, political activist and critic, who was imprisoned by the Franco dictatorship.

George Orwell’s Homage to Catalonia might not be the best guide to today’s Barcelona, but it shows what a city on the precipice of revolutionary change felt like. Like most of Orwell’s non-fiction it is powerful, direct prose.

The Time Of The Doves is, in some respects, the canonic Catalan novel of the 20th century. Written in 1962 by exiled author Mercè Rodoreda, the novel traces a woman’s struggles through and after the Civil War.

It was made into a film in 1982 directed by Francesc Betriu under the title "La Plaza del Diamante" (the title of the original Catalan book is La plaça del diamante, which refers to the Barcelona location near where Rodoreda’s character lives).

Buck's tour of Lisbon brings in plenty of literary references and stories, including the 19th century Eça de Queirós, the Italian Antonio Tabucchi, José Saramago and, over and over, Fernando Pessoa.

"A dispatch from a foreign land, when crafted by an attentive and skilled writer, can be magical, transmitting pleasure, drama, and seductive strangeness...an exuberant yet introspective account of a year’s sojourn in Lisbon with his wife and daughter.... his lyrical accounts reveal his struggles with (and love of) the Portuguese language, an awkward meeting with Nobel laureate José Saramago, being trapped in a budding soccer riot, and his daughter’s challenging transition to adolescence while attending a Portuguese school—but he also waxes lovingly about Portugal’s saudade-drenched music, its inventive cuisine, and its vibrant literary culture. ..."

"In 1925, Fernando Pessoa wrote a guidebook to Lisbon for English-speaking visitors, and wrote it in English. The typescript was only discovered amongst his papers long after his death...it shows us Pessoa's view of his native city - and Pessoa, as an adult, rarely left Lisbon, and it figures large in his poetry. The book can still be useful to visitors today, given that the majority of the sights described are still to be found."

Wilson's crime stories have settings in Benin and Seville, as well as Lisbon. Here Inspector Ze Coelho investigates a murder in the 1990s that lead to unearthing a part of Portugal's fascist past.

Tabucchi was an Italian writer, married to a Portuguese woman. He taught Portuguese language and literature at the University of Siena and translated Pessoa. This crime novel set in Oporto follows a murder investigation after a headless body has been found.

A look at Portugal's move from an authoritarian system to a democratic one as well as its integration into the European Union.

This recently translated fiction by Portugal's Nobel Prize winning author, tells the story of life in 1940s Lisbon. The narration centers on the intertwining lives of the inhabitants of a block of apartments shortly after the world war, showcasing the political turmoil

José Magone provides a comprehensive overview of the development of Portuguese democracy