About book Journey To The Alcarria: Travels Through The Spanish Countryside (1994)
Nunca me ha gustado Cela, siempre me pareció un hombre demasiado pagado de si mismo, pomposo y grandilocuente, encerrado a gusto en su circunstancia. Tan solo salvo sus primeras obras de la quema. El viaje a la Alcarria era una lectura pendiente desde que leí un fragmento a los diez años, en un libro de texto de literatura de mis hermanos mayores. Creo que lo he leído en el momento justo, he disfrutado el viaje a un tiempo pasado de caminos polvorientos, mulas y mendigos, posadas sin camas ni comida, gente encerrada en su pueblos desde el nacimiento hasta la muerte salvo causa de guerra o hambre, un país de zurrón y alpargata.Tambien he descubierto al Cela más humano, socarrón y coñero, que sale al campo a disfrutar descubriendo palabras y parajes, que trata a todos por igual. El viaje es un retrato de un país y una época que subsiste bajo el barniz de la modernidad. Puede que ahora las carreteras sean de asfalto, que los mendigos se muevan en autobús y que todos presuman de teléfono móvil en los más recónditos pueblos de la montaña (eso si, sin cobertura). Pero los motes, los prejuicios sobre los de los pueblos vecinos, el aplastante peso de los oropeles pasados que ahoga la idea de cambiar las cosas, de reivindicar lo propio frente a los razonamientos de los que mandan en la distancia...Eso sigue aquí, sasenta y pico años despues.
Cela prefaces Journey to the Alcarria with a letter to Gregorio Maranon, to whom he dedicates the book. He writes:I didn't see anything strange during my journey, nothing really shocking - a crime, or a triple birth, or a man possessed by devils - and I'm glad of it now, because since I had planned to tell exactly what I saw (for this book isn't a novel, it's more like a geography), if I start off telling horror stories people would say I was exaggerating and nobody would believe me.A fine, short travel book in which nothing much of note happens, recounted in a serene, perfectly crafted way. Traveling by foot and by donkey through this little-known region of Spain in the summer of 1946, the author provides a wealth of incident and detail. Written in the third person, the book tells us nothing about its traveler's history, his political views, or much else; the family that he mentions in the first chapter are not given names or personalities, they are left behind as Cela sets out and not mentioned again. This series of sketches never wears out his welcome, rambling on leisurely and concluding almost indifferently. Along the way he stops in some towns and thinks, as lonesome travelers are sometimes inclined, that he could live out his days there. Then he moves on. Journey to the Alcarria is quiet and unassuming, observant and beautiful.
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I was very disappointed with this as Cela has won the Nobel for literature and I found this quite a mediocre piece of travel writing. It felt nostalgic and may be more meaningful for people who know the area of Spain the book describes. I did enjoy some of the episodes but it didn't stand out as particularly Spanish, but rather, old fashioned or of a bygone era with less mechanisation and modern conveniences, a situation which one might still come across in undeveloped countries. I also thought it was a bit repetitive travelling, arriving, finding a place to stay and something to eat. All in all it seemed too pedestrian to me to deserve more than 3 stars.
—Philip Lane
