The Starched Blue Sky of Spain, and Other Memoirs: Memoirs of a Woman's Literary and Political Life..

by Josephine Herbst

In the 1930s, journalist and novelist Josephine Herbst (1892-1969) was widely regarded as one of the most important women writers in America. Yet the conservative climate of World War II and the ensuing Cold War relegated Herbst - like other radical writers of the interwar period - to almost total obscurity. By the 1960s, when Herbst composed the autobiographical essays in this collection, the insight of radical writers was being re-evaluated and appreciated once again. Herbst's reminiscences provide brilliant and evocative portraits of intellectual, artistic, and political life in the early twentieth century. Here we are witness to Herbst's childhood and young womanhood in the Midwest, her bohemian life in the East, and her extensive travels as a journalist. Along the way, she offers sketches of many of her contemporaries, including Allen Tate, Ernest Hemingway, Katherine Anne Porter, and John Dos Passos.

Genres: Spain, Memoir, Spanish Civil War

178 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1991

Reviews

[Sheri Hazeltine · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved reading Josephine Herbst’s detailed accounts of her time spent in New York in the 20s, on a sailing trip off the coast of Maine in the fog, and her time at the La Florida Hotel in Madrid during the Spanish Civil war in the 30s hanging out with the top correspondants of the time. Brave, funny, and always honest, you can’t help loving this book.

[William Kirkland · Rating 4 out of 5]

"The Starched Blues Skies of Spain," by Josephine Herbst is a small, mostly overlooked gem of reportage/memoir from the Civil War in Spain. Originally written in 1960 as a long magazine piece for Saul Bellow’s new literary magazine, “The Noble Savage,” it is available in book form with three other pieces, as Starched Blue Sky of Spain in several editions.

Although about the war she reported some twenty-three years earlier the essay is not of grand design nor something to read as an introduction to that war. It is a pared down account of her observations and impressions of the weeks she was there and of some of the people she met, both famous and unknown. Noticeably, to those who have read other Civil War accounts, it is not a romantic account of the conflict or the people nor predictable from her political beliefs.

Herbst was one of a small group of groundbreaking women who came to report in a war zone. The turbulent twenties and the women-in-the streets suffragette fight had ripped holes in, if not completely torn up, the fabric of dos and don’ts for many women.

Read More at http://www.allinoneboat.org/2016/07/0...

[Krista · Rating 4 out of 5]

Here's one of a number of wonderfully constructed thoughts: "The real events that influence our lives don't announce themselves with brass trumpets but come in softly, on the feet of doves." Josephine continues, "We don't think in headlines; it's the irrelevant detail that dreams out the plot".



Little gems.

I loved the first story, The magicians and their apprentices a tale of simpler times long ago in America and how the vast prairie didn't stunt dreams but encouraged them for many authors.

I also loved the third story, Yesterday's Road, where the author recalls her hesitations with communism even when she was living in the times where many were engaged in the good fight.

The title story was interesting but didn't grab me by the heart as the aforementioned did. Fascinating times and people though.

[Johanna · Rating 2 out of 5]

Ok, the last section was actually somewhat interesting...but overall, damn I'm glad I don't have to read this anymore.