Rezensionen 121 Peter Glazer, Radical Nostalgia. Spanish Civil War Commemoration in America. Rochester, NY: University of Rochester Press, 2005. Robert Sayre Slightly more than ten years after the publication of Peter N. Carroll’s The Odyssey of the Abraham Lincoln Brigade: Americans in the Spanish Civil War (Stanford UP, 1994), there now appears another work on that unit of volunteers, this time focused on the acts of commemoration of its engagement in Spain, starting before the conflict was over and continuing into the present. The author of this new study is Peter Glazer, an Associate Professor of Theater, Dance and Performative Studies at Berkeley, as well as a playwright and director. Not incidentally, he is also the son of a well-known folksinger, Tom Glazer, who, with Pete Seeger and others, produced in 1943 the recording Songs of the Lincoln Brigade, which was to become an important source for the musical aspect of the commemorations. As the author tells us at the outset, the work was originally undertaken as a dissertation, and the beginnings of his research go back to the early 1990s. Concomitantly with preparing the study, Glazer became friendly with many of the veterans and their families, and actively participated in many of the events himself. In fact, he directed a musical-theatrical performance at one of them in 1995, and scripted another that was performed at his university in 2000. Glazer is thus far from being a dispassionate observer/ analyst, and he acknowledges that throughout the project he has been both inside and outside his subject, “a charged role I am still negotiating” (5). The subject of the book, then, is the plethora of occasions that have been, and continue to be organized, which recall and honor the commitment of those the US government labeled “premature anti-fascists” at the end of World War II. Glazer treats his theme through two partially overlapping approaches: the historical/ political and, as we might call it, the phenomenological. On the one hand, Glazer gives us a rather full and well-documented diachronic overview of the evolution of the commemorative events, from those that called for US intervention on the Republican side while the war was still going on, through the diminished, harassed reunions of the McCarthy years, to the broadening of the audience of the veterans - become legendary - and their ceremonies, from the 1970s on, in conjunction with the rise of the New Left. Glazer further chronicles the return of the vets to Spain, to be honored there on several occasions after the death of Franco in 1975, the gala fiftieth anniversary celebration at Lincoln Center in 1986, and the surprisingly sustained interest in the annual events (particularly in San Francisco and New York) into the 1990s and beyond, as the numbers of surviving veterans have dwindled. In developing this historical material - concentrated especially in two chapters, one covering the period 1937-62, the other 1962-96 - Glazer has drawn on archival research, mainly in the Abraham Lincoln Brigade Archives, now housed in Tamiment Library, New York University. But he has also engaged in a fairly extensive ‘oral history’ project, conducting interviews with veterans, family members and friends, as well as performers like Pete Seeger and his own father. On the other hand, much of the book - predominantly in the four other chapters, outside the historical ones just mentioned - is devoted to a kind of phenomenological AAA Band 32 (2007), Heft 1 Rezensionen 122 analysis of the commemorative act itself, both in general and in its manifestations with regard to the VALB (Veterans of the Abraham Lincoln Brigade). Glazer discusses at some length the notions of nostalgia and memory, distinguishing between ‘restorative’ and ‘reflective’ nostalgia, ‘official’ and ‘vernacular’ memory, the first of each pair tending to be more conservative, the second more critical and open-ended in nature. In the embodiment of memory and nostalgia through commemoration, various aspects are considered paramount: the creation of ‘sacred space’, symbol and allegory, ritual and theater, the communality of an ‘interpretative community’. The latter term is taken from the literary theorist Stanley Fish, and throughout Glazer’s phenomenological reflections on commemoration he calls on concepts elaborated by thinkers in various areas of the human sciences: most notably, the ‘lieu de mémoire’ (‘locus of memory’) of the French historian Pierre Nora, and the ‘structure of feeling’ of the Welsh literary and social critic, Raymond Williams. Glazer lays particular emphasis on the role of music in the commemorations he is dealing with; he tells us that he was first drawn to his subject through the songs of the Spanish Civil War, and he devotes one chapter exclusively to them. With respect to music and song, it is from Roland Barthes that he borrows a key notion, that of the ‘grain of the voice’, and more generally the bodily, material force that is a potential of singing. In this book, then, commemoration of the Spanish Civil War and the VALB is dealt with in two different registers - historical/ political and phenomenological/ performative - sometimes separately, sometimes blended to a certain extent. The title of the book points to a thesis, and the demonstration of the thesis is carried out in both of these registers. Although it may seem to be an oxymoron, Glazer contends that the phrase “radical nostalgia” accurately characterizes the VALB commemorations. Nostalgia is not necessarily reactionary, but can be strongly ‘progressive’ in some cases. It can in fact galvanize its public into positive action oriented towards the present and the future, through the establishment of contact with a meaningful moment of the past, the intense reliving of a past ‘structure of feeling’ (Williams) held to be a model and an inspiration (in this case, courageous commitment to what has often been called the ‘good fight’). Glazer attempts to defend and illustrate this thesis both on the political and the performative levels. On the one hand, he details the ways in which at different times in its history the commemorating organization has intervened on contemporary issues: court cases during the McCarthy witch-hunts, condemnation (though belated) of the war in Vietnam, medical aid sent to the Sandinistas, etc. On the other hand, he attempts to show, through phenomenological reconstructions of the commemorative moment and interviews that evoke it, how the dynamic of commemoration can raise awareness, be energizing and forward-looking. Song - in Glazer’s view (and according to his own inclination) at the heart of the ceremonies he is studying - is naturally treated by the same double approach. In particular, in the chapter devoted to the musical aspect, Glazer engages in a prolonged discussion (taking up nearly half the chapter) of one especially important number in the commemorative repertoire. In this passage - one of the most interesting in the book - Glazer parses several different versions of “Jarama Valley”, revealing an extraordinary and important transformation that the song underwent. Put to the tune of “Red River Valley” and written in the spring of 1937 by a volunteer in the Fifteenth Brigade, which had been decimated in the battle of Jarama, the original version adopted a sarcastic tone to criticize bitterly the ineptitude of the political Rezensionen 123 leadership: after the horrors of the battle, the surviving remnant had been kept on the front line for months; then, when they had finally been sent back for rest, a counterorder had arrived, sending them immediately to the front again. The song in this form circulated in the International Brigade, and became popular as a vehicle to express general dissatisfaction with the leadership of the Brigades. At some time in the following months, however, it was rewritten by a ‘political commisar’; the critical element disappeared, and it came to be a simple expression of pride in the battalion in its struggle against fascism. Also, an ending was added which made it fit the frame of the commemorative gathering, asking the assembled to “stand to our glorious dead” (190). As Glazer points out, far worse than merely rewriting the song was the fact that the commissar attributed the bowdlerized version to the original composer, who had died in the meantime and could not protest. In discussing this key element (and some others as well) in the evolution of the song, Glazer is concerned with the political/ historical dimension. But he shifts towards the phenomenological when he goes on to point out that the modified version of “Jarama Valley” is the one that survived into posterity. It is that version that was sung by Seeger and the author’s father and that has been fervently intoned by generations of participants in the commemorations. It has functioned well in this role, Glazer suggests, because while the original was anti-nostalgic and disenchanted, the rewritten version taps into the emotional roots of the ‘commemorative urge’. I have already hinted at some of the strengths of Radical Nostalgia. It is generally a well-documented, informative history of a particular aspect of the American involvement with the Spanish Civil War, one that introduces a welcome element of oral history as well (although not all of the quotations given from participants are of equal interest). It is especially valuable in its descriptions and analyses of the commemorative events as performances. A creative dramatist and professor of performing arts, Glazer is well attuned to the nuances of meaning and the modes of their production in acts of commemoration that are first and foremost spectacles. His evocations of those at which he was present bring them to life as drama, and his readings of some of the photographs of earlier occasions (the book includes some thirty pages of illustrations) often perceptively tease out the theatrical dynamics implicit in the images. Finally, Glazer’s passionate involvement in his subject, and sympathy with its dramatis personae, produce a lively, compelling account from within. As is often the case, however, Glazer exhibits also the ‘vices of his virtues’, and the last quality of his work mentioned - strong identification with his subject - is probably the source of the main weakness of this study. For, while the discussions of the commemorations as performances are fully satisfying, in this reviewer’s opinion those that deal with politics are not. Although Glazer often refers to dissension within the ranks of the VALB, he is remarkably discreet concerning what was involved. He does state that the quarrels were often over political differences between Communist Party members and those of other persuasions, and perceived authoritarian tendencies of the former, but very little detail is ever given. Tellingly, in his thumbnail sketch of the Spanish Civil War itself in the introduction, Glazer omits those elements that form the centerpiece of Orwell’s Homage to Catalonia: the beginnings of revolution in the early days of the war, and the violent suppression of the same (through arrests, assassinations, and the military takeover of Barcelona) by agents of the Comintern in the Spring of 1937. In the same period a mendacious propaganda campaign Rezensionen 124 denied or ignored all earlier revolutionary activity, accusing those not in agreement with the Communist’s ‘Popular Front’ strategy of being in league with the fascists. This time frame corresponds exactly with the rewriting of “Jarama Valley” by a political commissar, as recounted by Glazer, putting it in a much more sinister context. Glazer seems unaware of the connection, however, or at least unwilling to bring it out. In the same way, Glazer does not probe deeply or critically concerning the role of the CPUSA in the VALB. When he does mention at one point that through to the end of the 1970s the former possessed the veteran organization’s complete archives and refused free access to them, he finds it only “disconcerting” (138). Later the issue is just touched upon lightly. Unfortunately, shying away from dealing with the unpleasant underside of the VALB has meant that Glazer has left unwritten a significant part of the history of that organization. Glazer’s reticence seems to come from lack of a modicum of distance from the object of his study. He clearly wants to emphasize the positive, perhaps both out of commitment to the cause and loyalty to friends. Also, doubtless, in support of his thesis that the ‘nostalgia’ of the Lincoln Brigadiers is indeed ‘radical’, that is, progressive and promising for the future. Yet on closing this book it is that very optimism which seems most open to doubt. Glazer tells us that in recent times the commemorative organization has largely overcome its disagreements by laying emphasis on what all have in common: anti-fascism. Yet this reference to a surface unity was precisely the ideological cover used as a means of repressive control in the first place. How, we would have to ask, can commemoration of the VALB be ‘radical nostalgia’ if the group devoted to it has not confronted head-on the demons of its past? Although, to his credit, Glazer does voice some tentative doubts and does not altogether brush the issue under the carpet, this question is never really fully posed in his study. In spite of these limitations, though, and judged for what is does do, Radical Nostalgia constitutes a significant contribution to the literature of the Spanish Civil War. Robert Sayre University of Marne-la-Vallée France Pultar, Gönül (ed.), On the Road to Baghdad or, Traveling Biculturalism. Theorizing a Bicultural Approach to Contemporary World Fiction. Washington, D.C.: New Academia Publishing, LLC, 2005. Patrycja Kurjatto-Renard. Contemporary fiction can no longer be confined within the limits of a single culture or a single nation. The articles composing the volume On the Road to Baghdad or, Traveling Biculturalism aim to offer a new way of analyzing texts which have been born out of a union of two or more cultures (in a narrow sense). This phenomenon AAA Band 32 (2007), Heft 1