Ralph Bates

[Louis Proyect <lnp3@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

NY Times, December 4, 2000

Ralph Bates, Novelist Who Evoked Spain and Then Fought Franco, Dies at 101

By DOUGLAS MARTIN Ralph Bates, who fell in love with the idea of Spain as a
working-class youth in Britain and went on to write evocative novels about
the real Spain in the years before the Spanish Civil War, died on Nov. 26
at his home in Manhattan. He was 101.

Almost 60 years ago he was considered by some to be one of the best writers
on Spain. "He stands out as perhaps the best informed - not even excepting
André Malraux or Ernest Hemingway - of the chroniclers of the preceding
disturbed decade in Spain," said 20th-Century Authors: A Biographical
Dictionary of Modern Literature, published in 1942.

But by that time Mr. Bates had reached the height of his fame, which
dwindled as he almost ceased publishing and withdrew, disappointed, from
the very public role he played when the civil war was a leading liberal cause.

For decades he brought nearly as much passion to politics as he did to
literature. He joined the British Communist Party in 1923, became a labor
organizer in Spain and then fought in one of the militias set up by leftist
parties and trade unions during the civil war. He broke with the Communist
Party after Stalin's pact with Hitler in 1939. During the investigations of
those suspected of being Communists in the 1950's, when he was living in
New York, he refused to testify before the House Committee on Un-American
Activities.

He was a highly touted literary figure in the 1930's, receiving streams of
favorable reviews for a considerable body of work. His fame was enhanced
when Spain's leftist government assigned him to tour the United States to
recruit men and money for its fight against the nationalist insurgents led
by Gen. Francisco Franco. His pace then slowed dramatically: a novel he
wrote in 1950 ended a 10-year publishing drought, and after that he never
published again.

He taught creative writing at New York University from 1948 to 1968.

Mr. Bates was born in Swindon, England, on Nov. 3, 1899. His great-
grandfather was the owner and captain of a tramp steamer that traded with
Mediterranean countries, particularly Spain, where the captain was buried.
The young boy dreamed of visiting his forebear's grave in Cadiz, Spain, his
wife, Eve, said.

The family's shipping enterprise died with his ancestor, so Mr. Bates, like
most of his relatives, went to work in the factory of the Great Western
Railway, which manufactured locomotives and railroad cars. He had only an
elementary school education, but completed his apprenticeship as a "fitter,
turner and erector." He was proud to have been part of a team that restored
the Lady of Lyon, one of the great locomotives designed by George Jackson
Churchward.

At 17 Mr. Bates enlisted to fight in World War I and became a lance
corporal in the Royal West Surrey Regiment. He taught soldiers how to deal
with poison-gas attacks.

After the war he returned to Swindon to work in the locomotive factory. In
his early 20's he went to Paris, where he worked as a street cleaner. He
then became a seaman and signed on with a ship going to Spain, where he
finally visited his great-grandfather's grave.

He walked around Spain, offering his services as a tinker and electrician.
He also repaired church organs, a skill he had learned as a gifted child
organist in his parish church. He became fluent in Spanish and Catalan. The
Spanish called him El Fantástico because of his vast energy: he organized
workers in a fish cannery into a union, climbed mountains, swam, wrestled
and slept just three or four hours a night.  Mr. Bates was camping in the
Pyrenees when the civil war began in the summer of 1936. He organized
mountaineers into scouting parties. Holding the rank of commissar,
equivalent to colonel, he also helped organize the International Brigade, a
group of foreigners who volunteered to fight Franco. During his recruiting
tour in the United States he met the woman he would marry, Eve Salzman,
after a speech at a Manhattan hotel on Oct. 17, 1937.

This year, as always, they raised a glass of wine to celebrate. She
survives him, as does their son, Jonathan, of Davis, Calif. In the 1970's,
Jonathan Bates was imprisoned in Syria on espionage charges; Secretary of
State Henry A. Kissinger personally intervened to free him.

As Mr. Bates toured the United States in the 30's, he spoke movingly of the
fight against Franco, who eventually became dictator of Spain. In an
interview with The New York Times, he told of the Franco forces routinely
bombing buildings and tents that bore the Red Cross insignia.

His novel "The Olive Field," telling of the life of olive workers in
southern Spain, was published by Dutton in the United States in 1936, just
as the civil war was starting. Ralph Thompson, in a review in The Times,
noted the perfect timing. (The book had first been published the previous
year in Britain by Jonathan Cape.) "Had author and publisher consulted the
stars, or their own prophetic souls, they could hardly have hit upon a book
better calculated to arouse interest," Mr. Thompson wrote. "Not for 40
years have Spanish affairs loomed so large in this country."

"The Olive Field" received some enthusiastic reviews. "The book is
tremendously alive and he writes with the passion and caution of a great
artist," wrote G. W. Stonier in Fortnightly Review.

But at least one critic suggested that the author's intimate knowledge of
Spain might not be the definitive advantage it seemed. In The Times Book
Review, Louis Kronenberger wrote, "Mr. Bates is so intimately at home in
Spain that he deals with it as writers seldom deal with an alien country -
in a manner that at times is almost elliptical, that takes many facts and
details for granted, that plunges in at midstream without teaching the rest
of us to swim."

Other books Mr. Bates wrote about Spain were "Sierra," a collection of
short stories published by Peter Davies in 1933, and "Lean Men" (Macmillan,
1935). His only two works specifically about the civil war were a novella,
"The 43rd Division," and an essay, "Envoi: Of Legendary Time." Both have
been published in various collections.

After Franco's victory, Mr. Bates went to Mexico, where he wrote "The
Fields of Paradise," published by Dutton in 1940. Other books Mr. Bates
wrote included "Schubert," a biography of the composer published in 1935 by
the Appleton Century Company; "Rainbow Fish," a novel (Dutton, 1937); and
"The Undiscoverables" (Random House, 1939).

His last book was "The Dolphin in the Wood," a semi-autobiographical tale.
Published in 1950, it was his first book in 10 years. He published none
after that, although his wife said he had written novels, poetry and a
travel book about the Greek island of Naxos, where they spent six months of
each year.

One reason for not publishing his later works, she said, was that he never
considered them finished, though she believes they are quite polished. She
also said his disappointments with Communism and McCarthyism made him a
more private person.

"There were many things that silenced him in terms of writing and being a
public figure," she said. "His disillusion with the political scene was
complete."


Louis Proyect
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