Amanda Vaills: Hotel Florida. Truth, Love and Death in the Spanish Civil War, Bloomsbury
Risvolto
Amid the rubble of a city blasted by a civil war that many
fear will cross borders and engulf Europe, the Hotel Florida on Madrid's chic
Gran Via has become a haven for foreign journalists and writers. It is here
that six people meet and find their lives changed forever.
Ernest Hemingway, his career stalled, his marriage sour, hopes that this war
will give him fresh material and a new romance; Martha Gellhorn, an ambitious
young journalist hungry for love and experience, thinks she will find both with
Hemingway in Spain. Robert Capa and Gerda Taro, idealistic and ground-breaking
young photographers based in Paris, want to capture history in the making and
are inventing moder photojournalism in the process. And Arturo Barea, chief of
the Republican government's foreign press office, and Ilsa Kulcsar, his
Austrian deputy, are struggling to balance truth-telling with their loyalty to
their sometimes-compromised cause - a struggle that places both of their lives
at risk.
Hotel Florida traces the tangled wartime destinies of these three couples - and
a host of supporting characters from Antoine de Saint-Exupery to John Dos
Passos - living as intensely as they had ever done, against the backdrop of a
critical moment in history. Amanda Vaill has mined the raw material of unpublished
letters, diaries, and reels of film - including Martha Gellhorn's personal
papers and Capa and Taro's recently rediscovered 'Mexican Suitcase' negatives.
The result is a narrative of love and reinvention that is, finally, a story
about truth, finding it, telling it - and living it, whatever the cost. - See
more at: http://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/hotel-florida-9781408813775/#sthash.g8mIv8lN.dpuf
Amid
the rubble of a city blasted by a civil war that many fear will cross
borders and engulf Europe, the Hotel Florida on Madrid's chic Gran Via
has become a haven for foreign journalists and writers. It is here that
six people meet and find their lives changed forever.
Ernest
Hemingway, his career stalled, his marriage sour, hopes that this war
will give him fresh material and a new romance; Martha Gellhorn, an
ambitious young journalist hungry for love and experience, thinks she
will find both with Hemingway in Spain. Robert Capa and Gerda Taro,
idealistic and ground-breaking young photographers based in Paris, want
to capture history in the making and are inventing moder photojournalism
in the process. And Arturo Barea, chief of the Republican government's
foreign press office, and Ilsa Kulcsar, his Austrian deputy, are
struggling to balance truth-telling with their loyalty to their
sometimes-compromised cause - a struggle that places both of their lives
at risk.
Hotel Florida traces the tangled wartime
destinies of these three couples - and a host of supporting characters
from Antoine de Saint-Exupery to John Dos Passos - living as intensely
as they had ever done, against the backdrop of a critical moment in
history. Amanda Vaill has mined the raw material of unpublished letters,
diaries, and reels of film - including Martha Gellhorn's personal
papers and Capa and Taro's recently rediscovered 'Mexican Suitcase'
negatives. The result is a narrative of love and reinvention that is,
finally, a story about truth, finding it, telling it - and living it,
whatever the cost. - See more at:
http://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/hotel-florida-9781408813775/#sthash.g8mIv8lN.dpuf
Il «Florida» di Madrid fu il quartier generale di scrittori e giornalisti filo-repubblicani durante il conflitto spagnolo. Volontari in un esercito ideologico poco fedele ai fatti
Stenio Solinas - il Giornale Ven, 14/11/2014
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