
In Hiding is the spellbinding story of a man who spent thirty years holed-up in his own home to escape execution. Manuel Cortes, a socialist and mayor of the village of Mijas in Andalusia, became a marked man once Franco's forces took power. Cortes stayed under cover until amnesty was decreed in 1969. This absorbing narrative, based on numerous in-depth interviews, chronicles an awe-inspiring ordeal and depicts one of Spain's darkest hours in visceral detail.
This work investigates the psychological and physical endurance of Manuel Cortes, a Spanish socialist who lived in self-imposed confinement for three decades to evade execution by Francoist forces. Ronald Fraser, a noted oral historian, utilizes extensive, in-depth interviews with Cortes and his family to reconstruct the lived experience of the 'topo' or 'mole' phenomenon in post-Civil War Spain. The book presents a detailed account of the political climate in Andalusia and the personal cost of survival under a repressive regime.
What You Will Find
Scope Limits
Historians and scholars of the Spanish Civil War frequently cite this work as a foundational text for understanding the domestic reality of political repression in the mid-twentieth century. Readers often note the clinical yet evocative nature of Fraser's oral history methodology, which provides a rare window into the long-term psychological effects of forced isolation.
Page Count:
256
Publication Date:
1982-12-09
Publisher:
Penguin Books Ltd
ISBN-10:
0140066004
ISBN-13:
9780140066005
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