A Long Petal of the Sea

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Author: Isabel Allende
Acquired in: October 2021


Some of the best literature ever to grace our libraries was spawned by wars and the ensuing trauma. Memorials and remembrance days are the only things those born in peacetime have to remind themselves of life-altering moments of the past. Is it, then, possible for us to fathom how deep are the wounds inflicted by bereavement and suffering? This is where books like A Long Petal of the Sea become important - they take us back in time to relive life as it once was, in this case, amid national turmoil and partisan conflict. 

Isabel Allende is no stranger to displacement. The coup orchestrated by Auguste Pinochet in 1973 toppled the Chilean government and lead to the death of the former president Salvador Allende, spelling disaster for leftist sympathisers and relatives of the late president, including Isabel's family. Narrowly escaping the gallows, Allende made Venezuela her refuge for more than a decade before settling in California. 


Back in Chile, she had heard stories about the Winnipeg, a steamer which docked at Valparaiso in 1939 with 2200 Spanish immigrants fleeing the country in fear of General Franco's right-wing regime. Victor Casado was one of the passengers on board; at the ripe old age of 103, he began recounting his story to Allende, who wrote a book about a man named Victor Dalmau closely based on Casado's years in exile.


Victor Dalmau is a taciturn young man attending medical school in Barcelona in the backdrop of the Spanish Civil War. When his brother is killed fighting the Nationalists, he sets out with his mother and Roser, his brother's pregnant widow on an arduous trek across the border to France. Peace is elusive to this harried family as they are chased from one country to another by revolutionaries and dictators. Struggling to find a safe anchor, Victor and Roser eventually find a home, only that it is in each other.


Thrown together by misfortune, Victor and Roser inspire me with their indomitable spirit to thrive where life flings them. I only wished the book was a bit longer; 312 pages seemed too small to contain nearly five decades of history. 


The lyrics from a song by Elvis Presley seemed apt to sum up this book:


Home is where the heart is

And my heart is anywhere you are

Anywhere you are is home


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