Language and Discourse

Hybridization, as an integral aspect of a poetics of exile, is firmly centred on the consideration of the creative process. Language and discourse are utilised in the texts’ respective approximation to divergent sub-genres: both in the reformation of Mistral’s private diary to a journalistic piece of public testimony and in the reconfiguration of Campoamor’s public essay to a personal egodocument. The loss of material possessions marks the departure of Éxodo: Diario de una refugiada española from its generic definition as a private diary. In exile, displaced from the home and stripped of one’s possessions, the body comes to be the sole entity that belongs entirely to the self. Martínez posits that exile writing becomes an extension of the writer’s body, and mirrors the expression of the exile’s physical and mental state: ‘[s]u pluma es concisa, documental, y espontánea; claramente su escritura es el único espacio propio en un lugar ajeno, es la expresión de su estado físico y mental, una prolongación de su propio cuerpo’ (2007: 178). Thus, in the creation of her hybrid text, Mistral renounces the only thing that wholly belongs to her as her body also becomes a public site of collective testimony. When her body, and by extension the bodies of the other women she represents, are threatened it is presented as a violation of the exile’s national space.

Women were often subjected to vaccinations and gynaecological controls and this invasive process is well documented in other female-authored exilic works, including Neus Catalá (1994). Naharro-Calderón suggests that in Mistral’s text the female body in exile ‘se convierte en la extensión del espacio nacional violado, algo que Neus Catalá subraya cuando habla de los controles ginecológicos: “Quelle répugnance et quelle trouille! C’était une torture supplémentaire imposée à notre condition de femme”’ (1998: 318). These methods of control converted the body into a vulnerable space that may be abused, presented as an extension of the vulnerability of the Republican body in exile. Mistral records these forced vaccinations by the French authorities as an injury to Spain:

A las mujeres nos han vacunado, sin delicadeza alguna, en la vía pública, ante la ansiosa mirada de cincuenta marineros del buque de guerra “Cyclone”. [...] Para que nadie pudiera evitarlo, desalojaron las cuadras. [...] Los marineros miraban con anteojos para no perder detalle [...] La aguja se clavaba con furia en la carne española. [ED: 86]

In one of the few occasions in which Mistral records personal information, she recounts the pain that she suffered from a resulting infection:

los niños pasan la noche llorando y yo soy devorada por la fiebre. La vacuna se infecta y mi pierna se convierte en un montón de pus. [...] [E]l dolor me hace gritar. [...] Caigo, desesperada, sobre la almohada, no sé si loca o cuerda. [ED: 92-93]

The depiction of such episodes of harassment and callous vaccinations in the French camps and refuges exposes women’s vulnerability. Their bodies, sexualised, are subject to abuse: ‘[p]or ello, sobre el diario planea la continua amenaza del abuso corporal que llega a plasmarse simbólicamente en una vacunación a modo de violación-prostitución que acarrea una infección: la pus discriminatoria de una vejación sexualmente marcada’ (Naharro-Calderón 1998: 318). Although this is material expected to be recorded in a personal diary, this piece of personal information takes on collective significance as the body of the author and other women come to represent the social body of the nation in exile. As suggested by Martínez:

El cuerpo de la autora, el cuerpo de lo narrado, y el cuerpo social se confunden, se mezclan, se superponen, se limitan y espacian dentro de Éxodo en una dinámica que sólo puede crearse en el destierrro, cuando uno es su único lugar. (2007: 178)

It is in ‘civilized’ France, a ‘nación que supuestamente acarrea el estandarte de los modernos valores ilustrados’ (Colmeiro 2009b: 36), that the female body — and by extension the body of the Republic in exile — is subject to multiple levels of abuse. Mistral records that ‘Somos prisioneras de una “nación amiga”’ [ED: 84]. She also recounts one woman’s reaction to this abuse in France as worse than her experience of the Civil War: ‘¿Es eso vida? [...] Alguna me dice: —Si ésta es la paz que tanto anhelábamos, prefiero la guerra o, por lo menos, la emoción de la “segunda línea”. Nunca creí que llegaría a sentir la nostalgia de la guerra’ [ED: 94]. When Mistral successfully secures a place on the Ipanema, prejudiced French people ridicule the boat’s destination of Mexico, suggesting it is uncivilised: ‘México —habla

despectivamente— es una nación “inferior”’ [ED: 136]. Due to a technical problem the boat stopped for several days in Martinique where the exiles are received extremely positively. Despite the Martiniquais’ lack of wealth, they offered fruit and toys for the

children. When a colonial French guard violently attacked a Martiniquan fruit vendor Mistral recounts how an exiled Republican movingly defended her:

–¿Por qué maltrata a la negra? Es una mujer como todas las mujeres, como las inglesas y como las francesas; quizás mejor que ellas, más humana, más sencilla, más buena. Su risa es franca, su mirar, sincero; su gesto, tranquilo, ¿por qué la enseña a odiar? [ED: 159]

Mistral juxtaposes the corporal abuse suffered by the Republicans and the Martiniquan woman in order to contest the Western perspective on civilization and barbarism parroted by the French before they left.55 In reference to the abuse inflicted on their bodies Naharro-Calderón suggests that:

Es a partir de esta violencia que Mistral plantea la deconstrucción de la ecuación civilización/barbarie y dignifica la otredad ejemplificada por el cuerpo de los republicanos españoles o los martiniqueses afroamericanos contra los que se mueve represivamente el espíritu del universalismo racionalista. (1998: 318) Mistral proposes that the female body of the nation may once again be liberated in Mexico, posited as a utopic space in opposition to the cold prejudice of the threatening French camps and refuges: ‘Estamos al fin de una etapa y en el pórtico de una vida nueva, que renace, el alma se dilata en una emoción nueva’ [ED: 167]. Language and discourse relating to the body as an abused national space is crucially employed once more on their arrival to Mexico. On arrival in Veracruz, Mistral receives a medical examination by an official doctor and her body is treated respectfully. This emphasizes the barbarity of the camps and the unfoundedness of the French’s opinion of Mexico as barbarous:

Las delegaciones sanitarias y migratorias despachan rápidamente el pasaje. Cuando el doctor me pregunta si estoy vacunada, por toda respuesta le muestro las tres enormes cicatrices que se hunden en mi pierna.

–¿Fue un médico o un bárbaro? —me dice. –Fueron los bárbaros —respondo. [ED: 167]

In this hybrid text the private diary is reconfigured as public testimony. Through the extended use of language and discourse relating to the body as a site for representing the

55

For a detailed analysis of the negotiation of civilization and barbarism, and allusions to utopian societies based on respect in Mistral’s text, see Colmeiro (2009b: 35-39).

nation, Mistral’s body, the female body and the nation in exile are positively liberated from the barbarous treatment received in France.

The depersonalised voices which correspond to the first instalment of La revolución española vista por una republicanaare overtly formal, in line with the generic expectations of the essay. The language is precise and the discourse within Campoamor’s political analysis is presented succinctly. However, the text’s

approximation to private testimony is centred on the discourse of her confession. The first-person voice used in it also serves to relocate her ostensibly depersonalised text as an egodocumento firmly rooted in the personal. Romera Castillo suggests that, in the analysis of the language and discourse of autobiographical texts, each different grammatical person encompasses its own significance: ‘[d]esde la óptica lingüística también es preciso detenerse en el uso de las personas gramaticales (yo, tú, él—ella, nosotros y formas impersonales) en los textos confesionales, porque cada una de ellas adquiere un determinado valor literario’ (2006: 34). The language utilised in the first- person appendix serves to humanise the entire political discourse that precedes it. Campoamor achieves this by cultivating an image of herself as a carer, an exile and at risk of death, thus conveying to the reader the difficult circumstances that surrounded her personal decision to enter voluntary exile. Mangini notes that the voice of political women in their texts is often stoical and devoid of intimacy — ‘political women tend to mitigate the dramatic nature of their testimonies because of their public roles’ (1991: 177) — as is the case in the first instalment of Campoamor’s text. Yet, in the final appendix, ‘Fanatismo contra fanatismo’, she reveals her position as a carer for her elderly mother and young niece: ‘No quise irme sin embargo sin llevar conmigo a mi anciana madre de ochenta años de edad y a mi sobrinita, únicas personas que estaban a mi cargo’ [LR: 209]. This serves to project a facet of her identity beyond her formal role as a political figure. Mangini suggests that if this facet is displayed ‘often their voices as women, mothers, and wives reveal the truth of Carol Gilligan’s theory that “women not only define themselves in a context of human relationships but also judge themselves in terms of their abilities to care”’ (1991: 177).56

The exhibition of personal information regarding Clara’s role in protecting her family locates both her political and private life, in the respective instalments of her hybrid text, in the wider context of her Spain and its people. In addition, she recounts

that when she and her family were destined for Switzerland via Genoa on a German boat, five Falangists were on board in order to carry out her assassination: the plan was impeded by the boat’s captain. News of this planned homicide reached her

accompanying family and Campoamor once again humanises her discourse,

emphasising her position of responsibility not only for the family’s safety but also for their emotional welfare: ‘el noble proyecto de asesinarme fue malintencionadamente comunicado a la señora mayor y a la niña que me acompañaban, de manera que los pocos días de su triste viaje de exilio los pasaron envueltas en una inquietud moral’ [LR: 210]. She includes a fragment of an article published in the Carlist newspaper El Pensamiento Navarro in December 1936 on this thwarted attempt, written by one of the perpetrators:

Supimos que Clara Campoamor estaba en el barco… Esa misma noche, otros cuatro falangistas y yo, nos decidimos a tirarla al mar. Pero después de consultar al capitán del barco, éste nos hizo renunciar a nuestro proyecto que podía tener consecuencias comprometedoras para él. [LR: 210]

This fragment not only corroborates the assassination attempt but also serves to further situate the autobiographical subject in her historical specificity, and thus the appendix redefines the political essay as a personal text: ‘[e]ste juego de perspectivas y de materiales incluidos en el último capítulo de este apéndice corrobora, desde un punto de vista externo, lo narrado; precisa la cronología definitivo del texto y lo redefine en un nuevo campo: el personal’ (Samblancat 2002: 43). The language and discourse of her appendicised confession humanises Campoamor as an individual, influencing the reader to reconsider the ostensibly depersonalised discourse pertaining to the hybrid text’s first instalment. The reader is now made aware that ‘el texto está escrito con los ojos

empañados aún por las imágenes de la guerra’ (Samblancat 2002: 39) which, given the immediacy of her situation, condition its generic hybridization. Therefore, negotiating the dichotomy between public and private testimony, the appendix endows the political analysis conducted in the first instalment with ‘una nueva dimensión al ensayo al convertirlo en su quiebro final en un egodocumento que inserta en un marco histórico una justificación vital’ (Samblancat 2003: 127).