Of Catalonia and New Beginnings

My first post revolved around the first book I read after graduating from college this May, Hannah Arendt's On Violence.  I am not sure, then, if it is appropriate, or merely an indication of my blogging laziness, that my second post will be based primarily around the last book I have read this summer before I begin graduate school.  Homage to Catalonia by George Orwell is an excellent book and has single-handedly kindled in me a desire to know much more about Spain and made feel a deep sense of disappointment that I did not put more effort into the two semesters of college-level Spanish that I was required to take.  However, I am sceptical because I am not sure if it is Orwell's marvelous writing that makes Spain so interesting or if Spain's character inspired Orwell's writing.  I suspect that both are true.  The book recounts George Orwell's trip to Spain in 1930's.  Initially, he went to report on the Civil War that was currently embroiling the entire Iberian peninsula, but was so moved by the cause of the Spanish working class forces that he joined a militia, spent months on the front lines and was eventually shot through the throat by a sniper.  The story itself seems utterly fantastic, but the book is simple, quiet, witty, it seems to be the opposite of war; there is no pomp, no glory only the reality that war is hell, but it is sometimes worth doing (though a war begun for noble reasons rarely remains a noble affair for long).  The style paints a picture of war that is unsensational and, I think, honest.

"One of the most horrible features of war is that all teh war-propaganda, all the screaming and lies and hatred, comes invariably from people who are not fighting." p.65


"It was like an allegorical picture of war; the trainload of fresh mean gliding proudly up the line, the maimed men sliding slowly down, and all the while the guns on the open trucks making one's heart leap as guns always do, and reviving that pernicious feeling, so difficult to get rid of, that war is glorious after all." p. 192