In this month's instalment of the MFL Book Club, I will be focusing on Fernando Fernán Gómez's Las Bicicletas Son Para El Verano. I must say, this book has a special place in my heart as it is not only the first Spanish book that I read on my teacher's recommendation, but also the book that I chose to analyse for my IRP Project as a part of my A-Level. If you are interested in learning more about the Spanish Civil War and its impact on the everyman, this book is for you! Today's recommendation of a medium through which to educate yourself about current issues affecting us is this video from Vox, "Protests aren't what they look like on TV" - particularly important in wake of this week's events.
G x
G x
SYNOPSIS
Contrary to the other texts which I have spoken about in this series thus far, Las Bicicletas Son Para El Verano is a work of drama. Naturally, this makes it that little bit harder to summarise and it is not helped by the fact that so little - yet so much - seems to actually occur in this play. Nevertheless, here is my best attempt at doing so:
The play commences with the fourteen year-old protagonist, Luis, playing with his friend Pablo in the outskirts of Madrid. Initially, their conversations range from works of literature they enjoyed to what they intend to do in the summer - but talk quickly turns to speculating the likelihood, or lack thereof, of war as they begin to play related games. Their naivety is rather striking, for we as readers know that, even in Madrid, war is and indeed was possible.
As Luis arrives home, we learn that he has not passed his physics exam and will need to retake it. It is at this moment that Luis and his father, Don Luis, arrange a deal for him to buy his son a bike if he will commit to passing the exam; after all, it is in summer that bikes are needed most and if he waits too long, it will not be of much use to him. What we do not realise at this point, is that Luis wants this bike so that he can meet with a girl, Charito, to whom he had been writing poems. At the same time, we are met with Luis' sister, Manolita, who tells her mother that their neighbour Julio has been writing letters to her and has asked for her hand. Julio, according to her mother, is too young to think about such things; it is not the only factor, however, that likely contributed to this decision, given that Julio was also from a lower class background.
Luis manages to meet up with Charito and reads his poems to her. At the same time, Julio's mother has found him a job with the help of another neighbour. They pick up a magazine to find a photo of Manolita in a competition to discover new actresses and they are scandalised by the prospect, for it was a profession that still had a lot of stigma attached to it. It is not long, however, before he tells Manolita that he wants to speak with her parents about their potential engagement and that, while he would rather she marry him and not have to work, he doesn't mind if she wants to be an actress.
Bit by bit, readers can see that the situation in the country is worsening. Food is beginning to be rationed, people are taking their money out of banks in fear of the country's weakening stability and attacks are starting to take place: the Civil War has begun. Luis does not seem to be overly bothered, however, as he starts to make advances with the house's maid. Eventually, their short-lived affair is discovered and María is asked to move back in with her family. In a bid to better his own fate, Don Luis tries to set up his own Trade Union to fight against the reforms that were being set out - a cause of future trouble in the novel where, with the win of the Nationalists, he faces great uncertainty as to whether or not he will be punished.
In the following scenes, members of Luis' family converse with various other friends and family members about the situation; things are changing rapidly and some people are more willing to comply with the status quo than others. Eventually, the news breaks that Manolita is four months pregnant with a dead army captain's baby; according to Manolita, despite the fact that they were in love, they didn't believe in the concept of marriage: a radical belief for the period. Naturally, Doña Dolores (Manolita and Julio's mother) is worried about what life as a single mother looks like but Julio comes along with a solution; that is to say, he finally proposes to Manolita and offers to act as a father to her child. This solution, however, is cut short by the fact that Julio dies in an explosion.
That brings us to the end of the novel, or a summarised version of it. Luis and his father stoll through the remains of a once great city and think back to their naïvety that no war could take place in Madrid. Some families, however, ended up better than others; Pedro's father, a Nationalist, has gotten a new job in Barcelona along with a new apartment and Pedro himself is going to study to be an engineer. Don Luis, on the other hand, doesn't know whether or not he will have to go to a concentration camp and Luis comes to the realisation that he soon about to be the new 'man of the household'; that is to say, he cannot pursue his dreams of being a writer and there is little hope for the future.
The play commences with the fourteen year-old protagonist, Luis, playing with his friend Pablo in the outskirts of Madrid. Initially, their conversations range from works of literature they enjoyed to what they intend to do in the summer - but talk quickly turns to speculating the likelihood, or lack thereof, of war as they begin to play related games. Their naivety is rather striking, for we as readers know that, even in Madrid, war is and indeed was possible.
As Luis arrives home, we learn that he has not passed his physics exam and will need to retake it. It is at this moment that Luis and his father, Don Luis, arrange a deal for him to buy his son a bike if he will commit to passing the exam; after all, it is in summer that bikes are needed most and if he waits too long, it will not be of much use to him. What we do not realise at this point, is that Luis wants this bike so that he can meet with a girl, Charito, to whom he had been writing poems. At the same time, we are met with Luis' sister, Manolita, who tells her mother that their neighbour Julio has been writing letters to her and has asked for her hand. Julio, according to her mother, is too young to think about such things; it is not the only factor, however, that likely contributed to this decision, given that Julio was also from a lower class background.
Luis manages to meet up with Charito and reads his poems to her. At the same time, Julio's mother has found him a job with the help of another neighbour. They pick up a magazine to find a photo of Manolita in a competition to discover new actresses and they are scandalised by the prospect, for it was a profession that still had a lot of stigma attached to it. It is not long, however, before he tells Manolita that he wants to speak with her parents about their potential engagement and that, while he would rather she marry him and not have to work, he doesn't mind if she wants to be an actress.
Bit by bit, readers can see that the situation in the country is worsening. Food is beginning to be rationed, people are taking their money out of banks in fear of the country's weakening stability and attacks are starting to take place: the Civil War has begun. Luis does not seem to be overly bothered, however, as he starts to make advances with the house's maid. Eventually, their short-lived affair is discovered and María is asked to move back in with her family. In a bid to better his own fate, Don Luis tries to set up his own Trade Union to fight against the reforms that were being set out - a cause of future trouble in the novel where, with the win of the Nationalists, he faces great uncertainty as to whether or not he will be punished.
In the following scenes, members of Luis' family converse with various other friends and family members about the situation; things are changing rapidly and some people are more willing to comply with the status quo than others. Eventually, the news breaks that Manolita is four months pregnant with a dead army captain's baby; according to Manolita, despite the fact that they were in love, they didn't believe in the concept of marriage: a radical belief for the period. Naturally, Doña Dolores (Manolita and Julio's mother) is worried about what life as a single mother looks like but Julio comes along with a solution; that is to say, he finally proposes to Manolita and offers to act as a father to her child. This solution, however, is cut short by the fact that Julio dies in an explosion.
That brings us to the end of the novel, or a summarised version of it. Luis and his father stoll through the remains of a once great city and think back to their naïvety that no war could take place in Madrid. Some families, however, ended up better than others; Pedro's father, a Nationalist, has gotten a new job in Barcelona along with a new apartment and Pedro himself is going to study to be an engineer. Don Luis, on the other hand, doesn't know whether or not he will have to go to a concentration camp and Luis comes to the realisation that he soon about to be the new 'man of the household'; that is to say, he cannot pursue his dreams of being a writer and there is little hope for the future.
MY THOUGHTS
I must admit, when I wasn't a little perplexed about what exactly was taking place I found this play to be a fascinating read.
In nothing but non-fiction works about a momentous period in history, we often begin to dehumanise those affected and forget that behind the statistics real people were affected by the events of such a tragedy. For me, this is what stands out about this play. Naturally, Spain's political climate had a big impact on people's day to day lives - but this didn't mean that teenage crushes magically vanished, or that hopes among many dissipated.
Similarly, I found that this play taught me various historical nuances that I couldn't find very much information about online. The most pertinent example that comes to mind are the bread bombings that take place towards the end of the play; that is to say, the moment in which Franco's Nationalist forces dropped down bread buns by plane wrapped in propaganda that said: "In national Spanish, united, great, and free, there is no home without a hearth or a family without bread" - a rather cunning act given the great hunger faced by the capital.
Admittedly, as hinted at above, this wasn't the easiest of reads due to the highly colloquial nature of the vocabulary - and this wasn't helped by the lack of resources online for this particular text. In order to help my analysis for the IRP, I ordered Juan Luis Suárez Granada's Guía de Lectura and I must say, it was an excelled aid. Although this text was do-able at a B2 or even B1 level, I would say it is a better fit for those working at a C1 level.
In addition to the rather conversational language, there was a lot of symbolism that I as a non-fluent Spanish speaker found difficult to pick up - though helped by the footnotes and my independent research. There are two examples that particularly come to mind here. Firstly, we have the title: "Bicycles are for the Summer" - rather obvious, no? That's the very point, you see; this a fact that seems so obvious to the reader that we become suspicious of its alternate meaning. In this case, the summer doesn't refer to a climatological period, but rather times of peace - and even at the end of the novel, bicycles are not for the summer because Spain has just come out of a brutal Civil War. Similarly, what we can see later in the play is that members within Luis' family begin to steal lentils from their very household because of the hunger they face. Unbeknown to me, this was also highly symbolic given that lentils became a symbol of the resistance due to their continual cultivation in the Republican area. As such, the stealing of the lentils depicts a dismantling of the Republican forces.
In spite of its difficulties, though, this is a book that I would highly recommend for all those who fancy learning some more about the Spanish Civil War and enjoy works of drama. I read the Colleción Austral version and found the footnotes very helpful, there are a few on eBay if you are interested!
In nothing but non-fiction works about a momentous period in history, we often begin to dehumanise those affected and forget that behind the statistics real people were affected by the events of such a tragedy. For me, this is what stands out about this play. Naturally, Spain's political climate had a big impact on people's day to day lives - but this didn't mean that teenage crushes magically vanished, or that hopes among many dissipated.
Similarly, I found that this play taught me various historical nuances that I couldn't find very much information about online. The most pertinent example that comes to mind are the bread bombings that take place towards the end of the play; that is to say, the moment in which Franco's Nationalist forces dropped down bread buns by plane wrapped in propaganda that said: "In national Spanish, united, great, and free, there is no home without a hearth or a family without bread" - a rather cunning act given the great hunger faced by the capital.
Admittedly, as hinted at above, this wasn't the easiest of reads due to the highly colloquial nature of the vocabulary - and this wasn't helped by the lack of resources online for this particular text. In order to help my analysis for the IRP, I ordered Juan Luis Suárez Granada's Guía de Lectura and I must say, it was an excelled aid. Although this text was do-able at a B2 or even B1 level, I would say it is a better fit for those working at a C1 level.
In addition to the rather conversational language, there was a lot of symbolism that I as a non-fluent Spanish speaker found difficult to pick up - though helped by the footnotes and my independent research. There are two examples that particularly come to mind here. Firstly, we have the title: "Bicycles are for the Summer" - rather obvious, no? That's the very point, you see; this a fact that seems so obvious to the reader that we become suspicious of its alternate meaning. In this case, the summer doesn't refer to a climatological period, but rather times of peace - and even at the end of the novel, bicycles are not for the summer because Spain has just come out of a brutal Civil War. Similarly, what we can see later in the play is that members within Luis' family begin to steal lentils from their very household because of the hunger they face. Unbeknown to me, this was also highly symbolic given that lentils became a symbol of the resistance due to their continual cultivation in the Republican area. As such, the stealing of the lentils depicts a dismantling of the Republican forces.
In spite of its difficulties, though, this is a book that I would highly recommend for all those who fancy learning some more about the Spanish Civil War and enjoy works of drama. I read the Colleción Austral version and found the footnotes very helpful, there are a few on eBay if you are interested!