The Barcelona writer Ildefonso Falcones she became a worldwide best-selling phenomenon at the age of 46 with the publication of her first novel, “La catedral del mar” in 2006. Seventeen years later, she published her sixth work, ‘Slave to Freedom’, the story of two women black women who fight to be free in two different eras: the colonial Cuba of the 19th century and present-day Spain. She addressed the creation of her new proposal, which came to light last fall, between operating rooms and chemotherapy sessions to treat the cancer she suffers from. Next Friday, February 24, she will be at Club FARO.
– You propose to travel to colonial Cuba in 1853 and to slavery, why?
– It is a subject that is not unknown, but it is separated or quite forgotten, that is not studied in textbooks. What took me the most to write that novel was the closeness: the fact that Spain was the last western country to abolish slavery in its colonies had an impact on me. My grandmother was a contemporary of slavery. And being able to transfer the effects of that situation of exploitation to the present time was what weighed on me, I would not have written a novel only about slavery on the island of Cuba, but I would have combined it with its effects in the 21st century.
–By uniting past and present, do you want to send a message that it is a problem still in force?
– It is a current problem, racism is not only in force but unfortunately in recent times ideologies and policies have been flourishing that do not mind being sustained by xenophobia and racism, perhaps a little buried. The UN studies and resolutions – we are in the six-year period of recognition of Afro-descendants – indicate that we are living the consequences of that colonialism. You have to think that when slavery was abolished all these people were unable to find employment, they began to be exploited from the most radical capitalist point of view, and these effects spread over generations.
– That was not the topic you had in mind, you changed it for health reasons, what was it like to write during your illness, between chemotherapy sessions and operating rooms?
– It was a subject that I had already studied, with a lot of documentation, and with the plot drawn up, so I avoided the deep study work that other novels take me. When writing it I went through all kinds of situations; At times it has been tremendously hard, at others it has been reassuring and therapeutic to write even if it was just a paragraph, even if it was in pain or in a situation of incapacity that destroys you. If I had to continue with my law firm, I would not have been able to.
– Do you choose two female protagonists to vindicate the role of women in history?
– It was a necessity. Great Britain had already abolished slavery at that time and Spain joined that agreement for money, but only agreed to abolish the trade, slavery was a visible legal situation in the colonies. The slaves were smuggled in from Africa and that drove up the prices, so the sugar producers concluded that it was more profitable to raise them than to buy them. From that moment on they decided to dedicate women not only to work, but also to give birth in criollo herds, which is an added cruelty and that is why the protagonist of the 19th century had to be a woman. The one from the 21st century could have been a man, but I preferred that she was a descendant of that slave.
– Was it difficult for you to get into the skin of two black women?
– I have no difficulty getting into the skin of women, I have already done so in several of my novels, and if not, I have a publisher. I have not had it either because it is black, but because of being a slave, I do not think that she has been able to capture 15% of the true hardness that a life of submission supposes. As hard as the novel is, I don’t think I have captured it.
– You deal with racism, colonialism, supremacism and job insecurity. Does the fact that injustices are present in your novels come from your profession as a lawyer or is it the other way around: you studied Law motivated by them?
– It comes from life, from seeing the injustice of those absolute, dictatorial, or decision-making powers that we live in even in the 21st century in democracy, although they are not comparable to slavery. Only genocide is comparable to slavery.
– In any case, do you seek social awareness in addition to entertaining the reader?
– My goal is to entertain in attractive situations that also have passion, love, money and revenge. I intend to give a real vision of slavery, far from the denigrating stereotypes that we have: we see blacks in the movies singing – how wonderful, those were the beginnings of the soul or of jazz!, –, but they did not sing for joy, but to avoid being whipped. The theory was that when a slave thinks, he works less; so that he doesn’t think, it’s best for him to sing. There is also the stereotype of the lazy black, when they were chronically tired because they were made to work non-stop twenty hours a day.
– What struck you the most from what you found in your research for this novel?
– Slave farms were cattle farms, they could be punished with up to 25 lashes for an offense; oxen were forbidden to be beaten. They died trampled by oxen when they fell while walking; the suicide was tremendous; sexuality, forced to avoid conception, which led to situations of sodomy.
– Explore the magical realism of the orishas and religious syncretism, how has that experience been?
– Very interesting. I wanted to move away from that folkloric vision, although unfortunately I did not find studies as deep as I would have liked, and treat that religion as one more, the only point of union that the black slaves had with their roots and explored the Sundays that gave them a holiday, which were not every seven days, but when the owner of the mill decided. It is a tremendously difficult religion, with a cast of gods almost more capricious than that of the Greeks.
– 17 years after the publication of “La catedral del mar”, what has changed about that anonymous writer who, at the age of 46, was looking to publish his first novel?
– A lot, Now I am sure that they will publish what I write, unless it’s a bodrio, and, most importantly, I’m guaranteed distribution. I had to stop practicing as a lawyer because it was impossible for me to combine both jobs, although I combined them until the third novel.
– Did you ever think of throwing in the towel when you couldn’t get published?
– I spent four or five years since I finished it, many times I got discouraged and disappointed, but I kept looking until I was lucky enough to find a publisher. During those five years I was researching other topics to write about, precisely about slavery in Cuba.
– How do you manage the success of being an international sales phenomenon?
– When we talk about managing success we imagine young athletes, singers or artists to whom the world is closing in on them. In my case, I had a balance in my life, all this caught me at the age of 46 and four children.
– What would you like to write that you haven’t done yet?
– I would have liked to write Harry Potter or be able to write Mafalda. Quino is wonderful, making people laugh through words is tremendously difficult; I would have liked to do it.
– Which phase of the creation of a novel do you like the most?
–When I have finished it, the rest is hard work in the mornings and afternoons in the office, it is not a job in which I laugh or feel special satisfaction.
– Do your children already read to you?
– There are two who have already read me. In general, young people do not read or do it in another way. Maybe we should ban them from reading, let’s see if they read more like that.
– Are you worried?
– I worry that reading comprehension is failing today. At the moment the apprehension of knowledge is through the understanding of the written word, the fact that young people are not able to read is a handicap for their training.
– If you could travel back in time to which moment in history would you go and which character would you like to meet?
– I would go to Rome to meet Julius Caesar.
– Is the historical novel more necessary than ever because it allows us to know the past in an entertaining way and not repeat mistakes?
– Knowing history in order not to repeat mistakes depends on the will of the reader. There are people who are dedicated to knowing her in order to make those mistakes in her favor. That will always exist.
– More at this time?
– We are in a time of absolute oppression, losing liberties sometimes as ridiculous as having the ability to go where you want, they are oppressing us, the skills in schools are changing, before it was said that knowledge set us free, it was the maxim of unionists, republicans, people on the left. Now it is the other way around, the lack of knowledge is going to allow greater oppression, and that is supported by those who a hundred years ago fought for access to knowledge. It is tremendously wicked.