Iberia by James A. Michener
And so in my early visits to Madrid I stayed at the Puerta del Sol, wandered in the Plaza Mayor, absorbing history, and refreshed myself with the mobs in the Rastro. When I had saved a few pesetas I followed the advice of a gentleman I had met at the Hotel Paris and took my meals in either of those two fine restaurants that lie just off the Plaza Mayor, Botín’s dating back to 1725 and The Caves of Luis Candelas, a rambling affair named in honor of Spain’s Robin Hood, who was a great favorite in Madrid. When I first encountered them these restaurants were well known; now they are world-famous and worthy of the reputation.
In 1966, as I approached Madrid once again as a tourist, intending a long stay during which I hoped to clarify my ideas about Spanish politics, I began to reflect upon the changes whose development I had observed during the last fifteen years, and I think the city will be more meaningful if I describe it in terms of those changes, which any tourist could have noticed.
In a sense no visitor can ever be adequately prepared to judge a foreign city, let alone an entire nation; the best he can do is to observe with sympathy. But certain recent experiences had qualified me to look upon Spanish life with better than average understanding. Spain was a theocracy, and I had lived in Israel and Pakistan, which were also theocracies, and the problems of such governments tend to be the same, whether the theocracy is Jewish, Muslim or Catholic. Spain was also a dictatorship, and I had recently come from the Soviet Union and could compare what happened in Spain’s relatively relaxed tyranny with what happened in a hard dictatorship like Russia’s. ‘We no longer have a dictadura, a dictatorship,’ a Spaniard told me, ‘but rather a dictablanda, a bland dictatorship.’ And what was most instructive, I had known Japan, and it, like Spain, was feudal, ritualistic, devoted to honor and committed to maintaining a closed society. In fact, I found Spain to be the Japan of Europe, and at many points I was able to fathom the incomprehensibility of Spain only because I had first met the similar incomprehensibility of Japan.
In 1950 Madrid was one of the most delightful world capitals to visit, for then I could debark at the airport, ride quietly along beautiful streets to the center of town and choose at will from some twenty good hotels, where I would be welcomed; now Madrid is grotesquely over-crowded so far as tourists are concerned and I have learned to steer clear unless I have confirmed reservations. In 1963 I could not find hotel space, but that was understandable because I had come in May, when the fair of San Isidro was under way. In October of 1964, when nothing was under way, I was absolutely unable to find a room in any hotel and had to scrounge around among my friends. In May of 1965 I invited an American to stay with me in Madrid, and all the services of the air line, the police and my friends could not find him accommodation. He had to sleep on a cot in a hallway. And in September of 1966, in the real off-season, I could find not one hotel room, and it was only when Don Ignacio Herguete, whom we met in Trujillo, interceded that something was provided.
The Rastro, Sunday morning.
Then Madrid had one of the most charming trolley-car systems in Europe, and on it I wandered through the various sections of the city, watching as people of various types clambered aboard to argue with the conductor. Getting about the city was not only easy but positively pleasant for Madrid had the characteristics of an overgrown country town, with unexpected nooks at the end of each trolley ride; now the trolleys have largely vanished and I have to go by subway or cab, and no other city has so miserable a taxi system. There are not enough cabs; they do not serve the proper centers; and they will not respond to phone calls. After the theater, or a bullfight, or a football game or dining out one must wait forty or fifty minutes to catch a cab, and even then he must walk eight or ten blocks to reach a point where cabs will stop. At least five times on each trip to Madrid I swear, ‘I’ll never come back to this city … the humiliation is too great.’ The government is aware of the problem but can do nothing about it, for reasons which have been explained to me but which I cannot understand.
Then Madrid was a compact city of one million, six hundred thousand; now it is a sprawling metropolis of more than two and a quarter million.
Then its buildings looked as if they were at least two centuries old; now the new growth startles me whenever I have been away as long as six months.
Then Madrid was a city of little traffic, for cars were few; now it is a perpetual traffic jam, not yet as bad as Florence or Nice but bound to get worse because within ten years the number of cars will double.
Then Madrid was a puritan city, with police watching for any display of modern life such as short dresses on women, or hand-holding between lovers or flashy dress on men, and the crackdown could be embarrassing. I saw English women thrown out of churches because their bare elbows showed, and German men visiting the Mediterranean beaches were arrested for not wearing tops with their swimming trunks; now the city is like a delightful garden in which young people in love kiss openly, girls wear pretty much what they want, and the only women who bother about covering their heads when visiting churches are self-conscious American Protestants. It is difficult to believe the transformation that has occurred in less than a decade.
Then if an American woman traveling alone wished to eat in a restaurant at night, even inside her own hotel, the head waiter would place before her a small American flag to warn the Spanish dandies that this one was not a prostitute, even though she was eating alone in public; now women frequent cafés alone, a thing quite impossible even five years ago. I was in one of the famous bars when unattended women began to appear, and one would have thought the roof had suddenly collapsed, but in late 1966 it was not uncommon for business girls to meet in threes and fours after work to drink beer.
Then on church doors across Spain appeared notices, which were taken seriously, warning females against wearing anything but skirts, and these of a dignified length; now minifaldas (miniskirts) and slacks are popular.
Then young people had few places to go; now it is quite different. On my last trip I stopped for dinner in what had once been a fairly good Chinese restaurant and was shocked to find in every booth a young couple locked in a public embrace. The owner no longer ran the place as a restaurant because he could earn more with less work running it as a cocktail bar for young people who worked. When I asked about this, a friend told me, ‘But all those girls still have to be home by nine o’clock. A lot of Spanish families are discovering to their amazement that girls can become pregnant between seven and nine in the evening, as well as between one and three in the morning.’
Then Madrid was a dark city with few street lights; now it is a lovely place in the early evening, brimming with light. The Avenida José Antonio is one of the most pleasant I know and its fountains are a joy. I have lived at one time or another in about six different parts of the city and they were not only varied but also charming. This is a city of much beauty.
Then prices for things like men’s suits, women’s gloves, leather goods and Spanish-style jewelry were low and represented the best buys in Europe; now there are no bargains, but quality is good and what you pay for you get.
Then there were few elevators, and if you wanted to do business with the average Spanish company, you had to climb, climb, climb; now each new building has its elevator, and sometimes it works.
Then the newspapers of Madrid were the worst one could read in any major capital, so fantastically bad that it would be painful to describe them. I happened to be in Spain during three different international crises and from the available newspapers I could obtain no logical or sequential news. Imagine how impossible it was to discover anything about Spain itself. Once I brought home with me three sample Madrid dailies to prove to my unbelieving friends how awful they were. The front page usually had a bombastic picture of Generalísimo Franco dedicating a dam. The second page carried a sentimental essay by some hack professor about how Cervantes represented the soul of Spain. The third contained an article on Bishop So-and-So and his belief that Spanish women, when they atten
Then television was nonexistent; now it dominates Spanish life and most of the Madrid homes I visited had a set. Since American shows are popular, magazines regularly offer articles such as ‘What Was the Real Eliot Ness Like?’
Then Madrid was a fairy-tale city in which one rarely dined before eleven at night and could go to the theater for the second show at one … in the morning, not the afternoon. There was an infectious charm about long afternoons in which luncheon was served at four if anyone was in a hurry, at five if not, and no one acquainted with Madrid in those indolent days will ever forget the gracious city; now, although the eleven o’clock dinner is still popular, one can eat at nine or even earlier, and the theater begins at ten.
Then wine was the drink; now beer is popular.
Then anything like a cafeteria would have been an insult to the Spanish way of life. A few were attempted but they were derided as American abominations; now grab-and-run restaurants are not only popular but essential, because the noontime break in offices is being shortened from three hours to two or even one. The most popular medium-priced restaurants in Madrid today are chrome-brightened places with names like California, Nebraska, Iowa and Samoa, the American name having become an asset rather than a liability. ‘You can trust such places to serve good food, clean food and quick food,’ a Spanish secretary told me as she had a hot dog while I had gazpacho.
The biggest social differences between then and now is the radical change effected by what a Spanish man called ‘the revolution of the Sueca.’ I had better let a Madrid businessman explain: ‘I’m not joking when I say that the Sueca has had an effect in Spain somewhat greater than the atomic bomb on those atolls in the Pacific. We had been taught for centuries that any woman who allowed a man to touch her before marriage, and I mean touch literally and not as a euphemism for sexual intercourse, was damned. Society was rigid and allowed no deviations from the central rule. Life was hard and anyone who transgressed was doomed. It was what you call in the United States puritanism, but much stronger than yours because our whole society supported it. Then came the Swedish girls, Suecas we call them, young, blond, laughing, the most beautiful girls in motion anywhere. Of course, there were also Finns and Norwegians and Danes and Germans, but we link them all together as the Suecas. They discovered Spain and flocked down here by the planeload. Their first impact was on the beaches, and once they stripped down to their bikinis and we saw what the human body could be, the old laws simply could not be enforced. You couldn’t tell a Spanish man he had to wear a top with his trunks when those damned Suecas were on the beach. He wanted them to see his pectorals.
‘Well, the first result of the Sueca invasion was cataclysmic. I can’t tell you what a thrill swept over the manhood of Spain when they discovered that such girls were on our beaches looking for sun … and romance. In the old days the proudest boast of a Madrid dandy used to be “I know a bullfighter” or “I’m having an affair with an actress.” Now it’s “I have a Sueca down at Torremolinos.” To have a Sueca as your mistress, tall and leggy and blond, is the best thing that can happen to a man these days. I know half a dozen of my friends who have Suecas, and their lives have blossomed like lilac bushes in spring.
‘Take this fellow Agapito. A very conservative vice-president of a bank here in Madrid. When I visited Torremolinos, here comes Agapito dressed in old blue dungarees, with a tattoo on his arm, a ring in his ear and a beard. I say, “Agapito! What the hell has happened?” and he says, “Ssssssh! I dress this way every vacation and tell the Suecas I’m a sailor from Alicante. They think it’s romantic and I’m doing better than ever.” I asked him, “But, Agapito, what do you do when your vacation ends?” and he said, “I throw a party at a restaurant and tell everyone sadly that my ship is sailing from Alicante and I must be off. They cry. I cry. Then I drive to the next town and shave my beard and come back to Madrid.” You know what I think, Michener? I think that one of these days some Sueca is going to go into his bank to cash a traveler’s check and there’s going to be hell to pay.’
This gentleman also told me that the Sueca invasion has yielded two unexpected results. ‘It’s been rather hard on the traditional Spanish gallant to whom courtship is a series of set positions, as it were. In church he stares at the girl. At the grille he sighs deeply. In the cinema he is allowed to hold her hand for three minutes … each show. He has his set speeches, arranged in order of passion, and these he delivers on schedule over a six-month period. It’s all been set out for him by custom and if he omits even one step the girl feels he isn’t properly ardent. Imagine what happens when such a system runs up against a Sueca who has paid a lot of money to get to Torremolinos, has a limited vacation and doesn’t have much time to waste. When our Spanish gallant starts to go into his set act she’s liable to say, “Sure, where?” I’ve seen a lot of Spanish men completely thrown over by such a response. They don’t know what to do. They’re unnerved and they run away.
‘But a more lasting effect has been the psychological. As I said, we’ve been taught that if a girl allowed a man to touch her, she was proscribed, but we see the Suecas come down, live with men, have a marvelous time and go home as good as they were when they arrived. In my group the enlightenment came when we saw in a newspaper that Birgit So-and-So, whom we had all known at Torremolinos, had married a Swedish official. One of my friends yelled, “But I used to sleep with her!” What he meant was that if a girl had slept with a man she was condemned. But here was this Sueca marrying an important man. It didn’t seem fair. But slowly the Suecas have revolutionized our thinking. Not all the world needs to live the way we do in Spain. I cannot begin to tell you how profound this revolution has become. Its effects will be greater, in the long run, than those of the labor unions.’
He then added an interesting afterthought. ‘It has many ramifications. Especially regarding you norteamericanos. We see your beautiful girls at our university here, or visiting the military bases. And we see that they are as free sexually as the Suecas. It’s fun for us and we have some great times. But then the nagging question comes up. “Should we respect the norteamericano for his manufacturing, his successful democracy, his rich way of life … if he can’t even protect the honor of his daughters?” ’ I asked him if he thought the Spanish way was better, and he said, ‘In the long run, yes. Women should not appear in bikinis at Torremolinos. Or stay out at night the way your girls do in Madrid. Women should be kept closely guarded at home.’ Then he looked wistfully across the avenue and said, ‘But the Suecas have ruined all that. Because our women have begun to study the Suecas too.’
This modern mother and daughter run a fashionable boutique.
One aspect of Madrid remains unchanged, then or now, the Prado. The collection of paintings has such a plethora of riches that I kn
I was therefore excited as I walked down the avenue one morning in 1965 and saw this stalwart, unimaginative building waiting. The miniskirts, the traffic, the restaurants might change, but the Prado remained permanent and unique. It is a family museum, most of its paintings having been acquired because some specific king or queen loved art and bought a specific painting. Here there was no buying of already assembled collections formed in Paris or London, the way the Romanovs gathered the paintings in Leningrad’s Hermitage. Here there was no robbing of museums in cities defeated in war, the way Napoleon robbed to fill the Louvre in Paris. The Prado began as a private collection formed for the most part by the people of one continuous family, at first Spanish, then Habsburg, finally Borbón, and it was never enriched by theft or expropriation. From 1492, when Queen Isabel I the Catholic was making her first cautious purchases, to 1868, when Isabel II of Borbón ended her reign, the pictures were bought one by one, and what we see today are the family heirlooms of this extraordinary sequence of rulers.