the last book I ever read (What You Have Heard Is True by Carolyn Forché, excerpt three)

from What You Have Heard Is True: A Memoir of Witness and Resistance by Carolyn Forché:

My school was run by the Sisters of St. Dominic, Order of Preachers, in the parish of Our Lady of Sorrows, in a church shepherded by an old Irish monsignor who, for some reason, was an admirer of a man he called Generalissimo Franco of Spain, and Franco, we were told as children, led the forces of the Church faithful to victory over the enemies of God in the Spanish Civil War. He was the leader by the grace of God, we were taught.

Thoughts of Generalissimo Franco marched through my childhood and came to a halt that summer in Spain with Claribel, especially as Franco was newly dead, and Spain was said to be “awakening” from nearly forty years of dictatorship. Posters in the public squares urged the people to Vota for this or Vota for that. These posters were works of art, and many people were seen peeling them from the walls before the election. Poster collectors, I thought at the time, somewhat naïvely.