We are going to present a book published in 1918, but whose origin is located three years before when the writer began to explore the coasts and landscapes of the Marina of Alicante on a somewhat painful walk, says the author, who started when the railway stopped the Navy was not even mentioned, at the end of said railway it is a fact. He signs the book Narciso del Prado and has a foreword by Eduardo López Chavarri who at the beginning creates confusion for us, since his first two lines are How to resist the request of a lady who asks you for a prologue to a book? And it continues: Its author wants you to know the region called the Marina of Alicante. We are talking about the book Coasts and Landscapes of the Alicante Marina. This contradiction with the name that suggests its author is a male and the female used by the prologue will be revealed later, but now we want to point out a piece of information regarding the time of its appearance.
The time
It was published in 1918, the year that much of the world was plagued by a pandemic named after the Spanish flu and that of the cockroach. Its name was due to the fact that if the countries immersed in the First World War censored the news about the flu so as not to demoralize the troops, in Spain, being a neutral country, it was the subject of much information, hence the reason why It was known as the Spanish flu, when it had nothing Spanish, and on the other hand the consideration that the flu spread as easily as cockroaches or that these insects spread it.
Precisely in that year and I believe, in my appreciation that it was not premeditated, but rather accidental, that at a time when civilization was immersed in a bleak landscape, the appearance of this small booklet was conceived as a jewel to raise the spirits of the reader showing the beautiful landscapes, not of the towns, of the coast that extends from Dénia to Alicante, in a trip made by a woman where the emotions and sensibilities of women are appreciated.
There is no place at this time to talk about that pandemic, although we will point out that in the journal of Hygiene and Tuberculosis that the Dianense Dr. José Chabás directed said that it mainly attacks healthy adults (the majority between 20 and 40 years old), it respects the elderly and is little serious for children. In Spain it left at least 260.000 dead.
In Xàbia the flu should also have been noted since in our annotations for the years 1917, 1918 and 1919 the incidence of deaths in the last three months of the year can be seen and the highest number is seen in 1918.
Data
- 1917: October-8 November-10 December-9
- 1918: October-27 November-14 December-8
- 1919: October-8 November-13 December-12
Having said that, let's focus on the book itself.
The book
In this Day of the book that it will not have a celebration because of the covid-19 it is good to talk about the book that appeared in that 1918 pandemic. When this book appeared the author was 73 years old. In this book the Alicante Marina is disclosed, “… its beautiful coasts, its delightful corners, the wild or peaceful places, or
austere, or kind, of that poetic contour ... It is necessary to have a soul full of that intimate love for the native country, to nourish ourselves moved by the infinite sentimental "moments" that the country can suggest to us, and to want to communicate with generous impulse to the rest of the people all the happy emotions that we felt before… ”.
The content of the book covers the region that goes from the Mongó to the city of Alicante itself, stopping mainly in Jávea (three chapters dedicated to its term), to go to Teulada and Moraira (three more chapters), Benissa, Ifach, Bernia, Fontilles , Altea, Benidorm, Villajoyosa, Guadalest, Busot concluding in the capital of the province as we had said. But in the description he makes, he does not want to go into "details regarding the towns, because his purpose is only to describe landscapes and seascapes.
The author who always uses her language as if it were an author, went up to the Mongó (without 't' counts: "Let us rest for a moment, that we must gather encouragement and courage to ascend to the high summit of the Mongó ... Three painful hours crown our efforts ... you climb up, reader, clutching at woodlands, thickets, pricking yourself with gorse, sliding down stony and sloping paths, leaning on protruding peaks, sweating, yearning for breath, excited the soul and delighted eyes. ”
And when he describes the roadstead of Jávea he does it in the following way: “A vast semicircle that ends at the Cabo de San Martín, shows us the most beautiful roadstead that perhaps exists on the Levante coast in Spain. It is truly grandiose… The wide and beautiful bay of waters always calm… waters like an immense mirror that portray the ends in them… producing a highly poetic ensemble for the artist; of calm and sweet meditation for the philosopher; of smiling grace and a pleasant impression for the lover of beauty ”.
These chapters dedicated to Jávea end with the following words: “I have described to you what my eyes saw,… I have shown you the beautiful; thereafter, he is silent; let's both concentrate; let us look at the lonely landscape with the eyes of the soul; let's dream and go back to the sublime ... ”
This book breaks with everything written by men and the feminine sensibility and even her musical knowledge is appreciated, as when she describes the 'grotto dels orguens': “The acoustic phenomenon is heard with delectation; it is small, an imitation of the fantastic grotto of Fingal, in Scotland… Mendelssohn composed a beautiful symphony, inspired by the rumors of the famous grotto. ”
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Page 23 of the Book Coasts and Landscapes of the Alicante Marina
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Page 35 of the Book Coasts and Landscapes of the Alicante Marina
The author
Under the pseudonym Narciso del Prado hides Paulina Ibarra Blasco. At a time when writing a woman seemed that it could harm her prestige to the husband, who was also a lawyer, musician and writer, he chose this name alluding to a flower that grows with this name in the meadows, mainly in the Upper Pyrenees, the narcissus pseudonarcissus, one of the multiple varieties of the amaryllidaceae family and originating in the Mediterranean area, while it had a masculine connotation with mythological reminiscences.
He could not excel under pain of undermining the scheme that followed the social world. But also, when we read the book, the author tries to completely hide her condition as a woman, because possibly if this book, the reader had known, although it is said in the prologue, that it was written by a woman, the readership index would have been much less and the latent prejudices about what a woman wrote, were unfavorable to him. This concealment of her femininity is done consciously with the use of masculine gender personal pronouns.
Furthermore, Paulina played with some ambiguity in this regard when in her novel "A Freethinker" published in 1914, it bears the following dedication: "To Ricardo Benavent and Feliu. Accept this memory that with all the effusion of his soul offers you your inseparable and faithful friend Narciso del Prado. ” In addition to this novel, Paulina published a theatrical play A Handful of Streamers: A Picture of Regional Customs in 1910 and in 1917 she published a book "Moral Articles" in addition to numerous articles in various media.
In this same year of the influenza pandemic, in June 1918, the Valencian Culture Center named her Corresponding Director, identifying her with her own name, pseudonym and activity, as the press said: Paulina de Ibarra de Benavent (Narciso del Prado ), writer, in Benissa. He delivered a paper that we have not found but that Francesc Martínez Martínez was sure to consult for his books on customary law.
She must have been born around 1845 and before 1899 she was married to Ricardo Benavent Feliu, who has her roots in Benissa where she has her pairal home, although the marriage had no offspring. "It is, then, according to the news, a friendly couple who travels the world in perfect agreement and mutual correspondence of hobbies and tastes, making life pleasant in pursuit of the good and the beautiful ..." said a publication of the time.
Ricardo Benavent Feliu
To complete the picture we are going to talk about her husband, Ricardo Benavent Feliu who published in 1899, A walk through Central and Southern Europe in two thick volumes.
He dedicates this work to his wife and we are interested in remembering the dedication that appears at the beginning. "To my wife. I would be notoriously forgetful, and I would even be ungrateful, if I did not dedicate this book to you, my dear Paulina, which owes its existence to your incessant and solicitous requests. You have been the cause of resolving to consign all my impressions, received in a series of seven trips; you, the one who has given me encouragement to collect my memories, so that they do not get lost in the oblivion of the years, and to succeed in the arduous undertaking, for me, of composing a book, when I have only rehearsed, up to the present in articles on art. Here is my finished work. Accept it, then, as due to your constant effort; May he give you proof of my deep affection, and, be very sure, that you are the inspirer of all my impulses and all my conceptions. Your husband."
Also published in 1903 published The art, aesthetic considerations about fine arts in general and especially about music. Following the chronology he published in 1913 the main cathedrals of Spain (Romanesque and Gothic): critical and descriptive essay preceded by a study on the expressive power of architecture and a comprehensive picture of artistic manifestations. In 1920 critical-philosophical history of architectural art from the most remote civilizations to the present and in its continuous evolution comes to light.
He was an accomplished pianist, playing eighty-many concert pieces, including Beethoven's nine symphonies, without a score. In this field he wrote a Mass in honor of the Immaculate Xiquette with mixed voices and orchestra. In 1920 he joined the Valencia Culture Center as an artist director, being presented by Francisco Martínez Martínez.
Paulina Ibarra appears in the book by Carmen Ramírez Gómez Women writers in the Andalusian press of the 1900th century (1950-XNUMX) as well as in the Abridged Javiense Biographical Dictionary while there are references in Ricardo Benavent Feliu's book published in Berlin by Antón Mansch: Mundo intellectual. Gallery of contemporaries in the field of Arts and Sciences and in the Dictionary of Valencian Music directed by Emilio Casares Rodicio.
It only remains to promote that Paulina's work, of which we have spoken, be reproduced in facsimile so that it can be enjoyed nowadays when the pandemic ends, while it will serve to provide work to a printing press in times of job insecurity.
In full confinement for covid-19, on Book Day. April 23, 2020. Juan Bta. Codina Bas.
Excellent article by Juan Codina that encourages reading the book. Those of this class, due to their content, their age and, in this case, even more so, by the author, are jewels that are read with real delight and more abundance because they are our homeland. Re-editing would be a good idea.