Diary in Two Voices

Spain in the winter of 1939. Among the hundreds of thousands of people who crossed the border seeking refuge in France, the Lamana family becomes separated, hoping to meet up again in the neighbouring country. A gripping real-life chronicle, these diaries tell of the experiences of a father and son in different French internment camps and towns; the terrible conditions suffered in Argelès-sur-Mer, the suspense and uncertainty of refugees in Ornans, the search for help and to meet up once more, the anger at the fall of Madrid... the uncertainty of the future.

The testimony of José María, the father, is an immediate account of those months in 1939. Almost fifty years later, in 1985, his son Manuel discovers his father’s manuscript and writes a parallel diary of his own memories of that time. So the reader is witness to a moving real-life story, an intimate tale written, as Manuel Lamana says to “share on paper what we could not share in life”. Diario a dos voces is a first rate historical chronicle, an unpublished text of great testimonial value and is of enormous literary and media interest, throwing light on an extremely important event in our past and rescuing an unjustly forgotten writer from oblivion.