Usuario:JosefaIz/Taller IZCARAY

JESÚS IZCARAY

Jesús Izcaray

Justo Jesús Izcaray Cebriano (Béjar, Salamanca, Spain, December 14, 1908-Madrid, Spain, January 10, 1980) was a Spanish journalist and writer.

Jesús Izcaray
Información personal
Nombre de nacimiento	Justo Jesús Izcaray Cebriano
Nacimiento	Béjar (Salamanca), Spain
Fallecimiento	Madrid
Causa de muerte	Cerebral thrombosis

In 1938 he won the National Prize for Literature in the democratically elected Second Republic for Madrid es nuestro, a compilation of his chronicles on the defense of Madrid, together with those of journalists Clemente Cimorra, Mariano Perla and Eduardo de Ontañón.

Life

Early life and training

Son of Petra Isidora Izcaray Cebriano (Béjar, *27-IV-1885-ⴕ18-IX-1959), single, and of unknown father, he was baptized in the parish of San Juan Bautista with the names of Justo Jesús and registered with the two surnames of his mother. He learned his first letters at the Salesian school, in Béjar, and was raised by his aunt Carola, Gregoria Carolina Izcaray Izquierdo (*Béjar, 12-III-1848 - ⴕBurgos, 10-II-1922), at the Fonda del Comercio, then located at 24-26 Sánchez Ocaña Street, inherited from her late husband, Ignacio Rodríguez.

Family and social difficulties in Béjar at the beginning of the 20th century led Aunt Carola and the nieces she had taken in at her inn to move the business to Madrid in 1915. They returned in the spring of 1916 to take Jesús with them. The boy would live in Madrid for the next three years, experiencing hunger and misery in repeated attempts to save a boarding house that failed wherever it was moved. The various locations were learning platforms for the boy and a foundation for his future life. From the streets of San Bernardo, Fuencarral and Monteleón he enjoyed the joy of children's games, the showiness of the military parades in the Plaza de Oriente, the movies in neighborhood cinemas, the paintings in the Prado Museum, the music of small orchestras in cafes, the sweets from the bakery of San Onofre, the reasons for the workers' demonstrations and the gang backtalk/sass in the neighborhood of Malasaña.

The Izcaray family finally decided to move to Burgos, where they were employed in the playing card factory of Don Antonio Moliner.

Jesús made his first communion in the church of San Lesmes Abad in Burgos on May 13, 1920. Having dropped out of the Marist school in Burgos, his family found him some private classes. The adolescent began his self-education with abundant and nourishing readings of classical Spanish literature.

After the death of his aunt Carola and a devastating fire in the building of the naipera company, which occurred on December 19, 1922, his aunt and uncle Carmen García Izcaray and Francisco Cameno moved to Barcelona, and with them, his nephew. Given his ideological disagreements with Francisco Cameno, the young man requested a place as a volunteer to fulfill his military service in the Leon Infantry Regiment, No. 38, located in the Plaza de San Francisco el Grande, in Madrid.

In Madrid in the 1930s

Izcaray returned to the Spanish capital in 1929, determined to begin his career as a writer. He first joined El Imparcial -which he would leave two years later in disagreement with the newspaper's policy regarding the Statute of Catalonia-, and he would collaborate sporadically in the weekly literary supplement "Los Lunes de El Imparcial". His work as a reporter brought him into contact with the socio-political reality of the time, and his readings of Lenin definitively oriented his ideas. He ended up aligning himself among the young socialists of the left wing.

His journalistic activity continues in various Madrid newspapers. For the theatrical page of La Voz he interviews, among others, Manuel Azaña, Celia Gámez, Amadeo Vives. For the Heraldo de Madrid he writes reports on the vedettes and revues at the Reina Victoria, the Nuevo Romea, the Eslava, the Fuencarral, the Pavón or the Maravillas. In the theater section run by Juan Chabás in Luz he published his conversations with Pedro Muñoz Seca, with Eduardo Marquina, with Rafael Alberti, with Margarita Xirgu, with Ramón Gómez de la Serna and many other voices that coincided in calling for the renovation of the Spanish theater. After a brief period in Diario de Madrid, Manuel Chaves Nogales incorporated him, in February 1935, to the staff of the graphic newspaper Ahora. By then, Jesús Izcaray had already written, together with Nicolás Escanilla, his first book, El socialismo español después de octubre (Posición de líderes y masas). In 1936 he also began to collaborate sporadically in the magazine Estampa.

After participating in the assault on the Montaña barracks, in Madrid, soldier and journalist during the Spanish Civil War of 1936-1939, he will send his chronicles from various fronts, to Ahora and Estampa. At the end of 1936, he began to write for Mundo Obrero and Frente Rojo, the publications of the Communist Party of Spain, which he joined in December of the same year.

Exile in Mexico after the Spanish Civil War /After the Spanish Civil War, exile in Mexico.

When the Government of the Second Spanish Republic moved to Valencia, Izcaray also left Madrid. He did so on November 6, 1936, in the newspaper's car, together with Manuel Chaves Nogales, Paulino Masip, Manuel D. Benavides and Clemente Cimorra. However, thinking of the militiamen/soldiers with whom he had fought, he decided to return to the defense of Madrid.

Sent to Barcelona in 1938 as deputy director of Frente Rojo, the Bejarano will remain in Barcelona until his departure for exile on February 9, 1939, through Portbou (Girona), together with Colonel Juan Guilloto León, "Modesto", and Wenceslao Roces.

After a brief stay / After a few months in the Argelès-sur-Mer concentration camp, he takes advantage of the generous openness of Mexican President Lázaro Cárdenas towards Spanish Republican exiles and sails from Sète (France) on the steamship Siania on May 25. He disembarks in the Mexican port of Veracruz on June 13, 1939, together with his wife Elena Caamaño Cimadevila. The couple settles in Mexico City and, until they find work, they are dependent on the aid received from their own party and the economic support of the Servicio de Evacuación de Republicanos Españoles (SERE), presided by Juan Negrín, or the Junta de Auxilio a los Republicanos Españoles (JARE), of Indalecio Prieto, through the Comité Técnico de Ayuda a los Refugiados Españoles en México (CTAREM).

In Mexico City, the Spanish journalist contributes to the founding of España Popular. Semanario al servicio del pueblo español, whose first issue appeared on February 18, 1940. On the masthead are José Renau, as owner director, and J. Izcaray, as editor-in-chief.

Izcaray's activity in Mexico is abundant, although many of his works are unsigned. This is the case of the film scripts he wrote with Alfonso Lapeña, an adaptation of the novel Divorciadas, by Mexican author Julia Guzmán, or the musical comedy entitled Tarde de lluvia, a biography of Rossini that never made it to the screen. In addition to dealing with España Popular, the journalist sent articles to the Mexican magazine Estampa -published by the newspaper of the Mexican capital, Excélsior-, and undertook a biography of the maestro Agustín Lara.

Clandestine return to Spain

On April 8, 1941 Izcaray obtained his Mexican naturalization letter and, later, his Mexican passport. In 1944, with the mission of strengthening the anti-Francoist guerrilla struggle in Spain, he embarked on the steamship Cabo de Hornos in Buenos Aires, bound for Lisbon, where he arrived on December 31. With the documents of another comrade, he clandestinely enters Spain through the mountains of Galicia and, avoiding staying in Madrid, where he could be recognized, he joins the guerrillas in the Levante area. He recounted his experiences in a series of reports published by Mundo Obrero, Ce Soir, Alger Républicain, Regards, L'Operaio Italiano and España Popular, before compiling them in two volumes, Las guerrillas de Levante (1948) and Treinta días con los guerrilleros de Levante (1951).

The end of exile /End of exile

Izcaray left Spain again in 1946, and finally settled in Paris. There he directs Mundo Obrero, writes reviews of works by contemporary Spanish authors for magazines such as Nuestra Bandera, Cuadernos de Cultura, Nuestras Ideas, Europe, Realidad, and begins his dedication to literature; short stories and novels that will be translated into French, Italian, German, Bulgarian, Dutch, Czech, Polish, Hungarian, Chinese and Russian: Noche adelante (Novelas breves y cuentos) (1962), La hondonada (1961), Las ruinas de la muralla, Madame García, tras los cristales, and his projected tetralogy -a mixture of fiction and memoirs- El río hacia el mar, of which he published only two novels -Un muchacho en la Puerta del Sol (1978), Cuando estallaron los volcanes (1979)-, and left unfinished a draft of what would be the third, Puente de sangre.

Although he entered and left Spain clandestinely on several occasions during his exile in France, his official return to Spain took place on November 14, 1976. Together with his second wife, Marcela Santandreu, Flora, he settled in Madrid, where he continued writing articles for different national newspapers, new novels and oversaw managing the publication or re-publication of some of his works in Spain.

Death

Justo Jesús Izcaray Cebriano died at 00:40 on January 10, 1980, in the now defunct/disappeared Madrid clinic Nuestra Señora de Loreto, due to cerebral thrombosis.

Awards

National Prize for Literature, 1938 (Spain, Republican zone).

Works

Essay

• 1935 – El socialismo español después de octubre (Posición de líderes y masas). Con Nicolás Escanilla.

Biographies

• 1948 – Héroes de España: Casto García Roza
• 1949 – Quien tenga honra que me siga (Manuela Sánchez, la heroína de Carres)

Chronicles and reports

• 1937 – Crónicas de la guerra (Recopilación de artículos periodísticos)
• 1938 – Madrid es nuestro (60 crónicas de su defensa). Con Clemente Cimorra, Mariano Perla y Eduardo de Ontañón. Premio Nacional de Literatura, España zona republicana, 1938.
• 1948 – Martyre des femmes d’Espagne
• 1948 – Las guerrillas de Levante
• 1951 – Treinta días con los guerrilleros de Levante
• 1962 – Reportaje en Cuba
• 1978 – La guerra que yo viví

Novels

• 1961 – La hondonada
• 1962 – Noche adelante (Novelas breves y cuentos)
• 1965 –Las ruinas de la muralla
• 1968 – Madame García, tras los cristales
• 1973 – Un muchacho en la Puerta del Sol
• 1978 – Cuando estallaron los volcanes

Bibliography /Sources

• Aub, E. Entrevista realizada a Jesús Izcaray por Elena Aub, en Madrid, España, 25 y 30 de octubre y 14 de noviembre de 1979. Fondo de Historia Oral: Refugiados españoles en México. Archivo de la palabra. Biblioteca Nacional de Antropología e Historia Dr. Eusebio Dávalos Hurtado. Mediateca INAH (Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia) de México. https://mediateca.inah.gob.mx/repositorio/islandora/object/entrevista%3A907 (Consultado el 9 de septiembre de 2022).
• Aznar Soler, M. y López García, J. R. (Eds.). (2016). Diccionario biobibliográfico de los escritores, editoriales y revistas del exilio republicano de 1939. Sevilla: Renacimiento.
• Báez-Ramos, J. (1989). El juego erótico del macho en las novelas de J. Izcaray en M. C. López Alonso (coord.). Eros literario. (pp. 233-244) Madrid: Universidad Complutense de Madrid.
• — (1993). Jesús Izcaray: un exiliado en la órbita del realismo social en VV. AA. Cuadernos Interdisciplinarios de Estudios Literarios. (T. 4, n. º 1) Ámsterdam: Universidad de Ámsterdam.
• — (1994). La obra literaria de Jesús Izcaray. Salamanca: Centro de Estudios Salmantinos.
• — (2000). Edición y estudio introductorio: Izcaray, J. Noche adelante. Salamanca: Cervantes.
• — (2000). Jesús Izcaray, escritor. Papeles del Novelty, Salamanca pp. 29-35.
• — (2002). Las novelas de Jesús Izcaray: formulación literaria de un compromiso. Cuadernos del Sornabique (6), 111-137.
• — (2004). Edición y estudio introductorio: Izcaray, J. La hondonada. Salamanca: Cervantes.
• — (2006). Edición y estudio introductorio: Izcaray, J. Madame García, tras los cristales. Sada: Ediciós do Castro, Biblioteca del Exilio.
• — (2023). La escritura como liberación. Jesús Izcaray. Béjar: Centro de Estudios Bejaranos.
• — (2023). El fecundo nomadismo de Jesús Izcaray. Estudios Bejaranos (27), 203-216.
• Cambra, J. (17-23 de enero de 1980) «Murió Jesús Izcaray. La pérdida de un escritor, un militante». Mundo Obrero.
• Clavijo-Ledesma, J. La política sobre la població refugiada durant la guerra civil 1936-1939. (Tesis doctoral). Universidad de Gerona. https://dugi-doc.udg.edu/bitstream/handle/10256/4964/tjcl.pdf
• Ordóñez-Alonso, M. M. (1977). El Comité Técnico de Ayuda a los Republicanos Españoles: historia y documentos, 1939-40. México D. F.: Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia. Serie Documentos. Colección Fuentes.
• Sánchez-Harguindey, A. (7 de marzo de 1977) Entrevista. Jesús Izcaray: «Toda novela es social y la mía también». Hoy se presenta su obra «Madame García, tras los cristales». El País.

External links

• Ateneo Español de México, https://www.ateneoesmex.com/
• Archivo General de la Nación, México, https://www.gob.mx/agn
• Promotora Cultural Fernando Gamboa, https://promotorafernandogamboa.org
• Archivo Histórico del Partido Comunista de España, Archivo Histórico del PCE,https://www.archivohistoricopce.org
• Fundación Pablo Iglesias, https://fpabloiglesias.es/archivo-y-biblioteca/contacto-archivo/
• Archivo General de la Administración, España, https://www.cultura.gob.es/cultura/areas/archivos/mc/archivos/aga/portada.html