Reviews and Essays

Lured by the revolutionary Second Spanish Republic, the Norwegian journalist Leif Borthen came to Majorca in 1932 but spent his days in a stupor of booze and banter with a crew of starving idealists. A haphazard venture into antique dealing delivered him to San Vicente, Ibiza, a primeval paradise that was then inaccessible by road. After spending a year hunting with illiterate postmen and fishing with priests, he left this sanctuary, only to return almost thirty years later, when talk of a new road threatened its simple ways and Spain was burdened by Fascism.

This excerpt from a larger travelogue, originally published in Norway in 1967 and now translated into eloquent English by Martin Davies and Bjorn Lindholm, meanders back and forth between these two visits. In the 1960s, Borthen is pleased that progress has yet to destroy Ibiza's way of life: "They were still using the sort of plough found only in museums, as well as a type of mattock designed by Egyptians well before the Phoenicians were knocking around". The island's Phoenician past is fascinating to the writer, but his treatment of Iberia's Muslim heritage borders on Arab-phobic. To indicate one man's peculiarity, Borthen refers to his "emaciated, Arab-looking body", and he describes local farmers as "almost Nordic" and not containing "even a hint of Arab" with some glee. These archaic attitudes aside, his memoir is worth reading for its raw exuberance and for its portrayal of such vivid characters as the enigmatic Ibiza resident Raoul Villain, who assassinated the French socialist leader Jean Jaures in 1914.

This version of The Road to San Vicente concludes with other texts on Ibiza, including an unexceptional letter from Walter Benjamin and a rant by Norman Lewis about tourism's insidious effects on local society. The various components of this book don't adequately grapple with the often destructive relationship between traveller and destination. The author seems are unwilling to confront the fact that all outsiders - not just package tourists, but even writers - have blood on their hands when it comes to the death of beautiful places like Ibiza.