Scripta Mediterranea (E-Journal)

SCRIPTA, SCRIPTA

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CONTRIBUTORS 
Suzanne Conklin Akbari 
Educated at Johns Hopkins and Columbia, she is Assistant Professor of English 
and Medieval Studies at the University of Toronto. The article presented here is 
part of a work in progress called, "Orientalism in Medieval Literature from the 
Twelfth Century to 1492." 
Thomas E. Burman 
Thomas E. Burman received his Ph.D. from the Centre for Medieval Studies at the 
University of Toronto in 1991, and is currently an associate professor of history 
at the University of Tennessee. His research has focused on the intellectual and 
religious relations between medieval Christendom and Islam. His study of the in-
tellectual history of the Arabic-speaking Christians of Spain, Religious Polemic 
and the Intellectual History of the Mozarabs, c. 1050-1200, was published by E. J. 
Brill in 1994. Currently he is working on a book-length study of how medieval 
and early-modem European Christians read and interpreted the Qur'an, a topic 
he explored in his most recent publication, "Tafsir and Translation: Traditional 
Qur'an Exegesis and the Latin Qur'ans of Robert of Ketton and Mark of Toledo," 
Speculum 73 (1998):703-32. 
Charles Burnett 
Charles Burnett (born 1951), undergraduate, research student and research fellow 
at St John's College, Cambridge (1969-79), Senior Research Fellow, Warburg Insti-
tute, (1979-82), Leverhulme Research Fellow, Sheffield Univer-sity (1982-4), 
Member of the Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, (1984-5), Lecturer in the 
history of Arabic/ Islamic Influence in Europe in the Middle Ages at the Warburg 
Institute (1985 to present). Published extensively on the transmission of Arabic 
learning to the West, including editions of Hermann of Carinthia's De essentiis 
(Leiden, 1982), and Abu Ma'shar's The Abbreviation of the Introduction to Astrol-
ogy (with M. Yano and K. Yama-moto), in Arabic, English and Latin (Leiden, 
1994), and books on Magic and Divination in the Middle Ages: Texts and Tech-
niques in the Islamic and ChristianWorlds (Aldershot, 1996) and The Introduction 
of Arabic Learning into England (London, 1997). 
Arnold Cassola 
Teaches Maltese and Comparative Literature at the University of Malta, having 
previously taught at the Universities of Catania and Rome "La Sapienza." Au-
thor and editor of various works including The Biblioteca Vallivelliana "regole 
per la lingua maltese" (Malta, 1992), Mediterranean Island Literature (Malta, 
1994), The Great Siege of Malta and the Istanbul State Archives (Malta, 1995), II 
288 Cnntributors 
"Mezzo Vocabolario" maltese-Italliano de/ '700 (Malta, 1996), L'italiano di Malta 
(Malta, 1998) and (in collaboration with I. Bostan and T. Scheben) The 1565 Ot-
toman "Malta Campaign Register." 
Brian Catlos 
A graduste of the Centre for Medieval Studies at the University of Toronto, he 
completed his dissertation, "The Victors and the Vanquished: Christians and 
Muslims of the Ebro Valley, ss. XI-XIII" under the direction of Dr. Andrew Wat-
son. His current project "Conflicts of Interest: Individual and Community Minor-
ity Self-Administration in the 14th-Century Crown of Aragon" is supervises by 
Thomas F. Glick of Boston University. He has published articles on topics rele-
vant to his dissertation as well as on Christian-Muslim relations in Crusade-era 
Egypt, a translation of a tenth-century Andalusi work on women in Islam, and a 
number of shorter articles and reviews. 
Maria Teresa Ferrer i Mallol 
Born in Barcelona in 1940, she taught various courses at the University of 
Barcelona where she had received her doctorate, until appointed to the Instituci6 
Mila i Fontanals of the Consejo Superior de lnvestigaciones Cientificas in 
Barcelona in 1989. Since that time she has worked in a number of capacities there, 
including a period as director; currently she is director of several journals includ-
ing the Anuario de estudios medievales and Miscellanea d'es tudis medievals. Her 
research interests include the study of the mudejars of the Crown of Aragon, and 
the relationship of the Crown to the Islamic world. Among her numerous books, 
articles and editions are Eis sarrains de la Corona catalano-aragonesa en el segle 
XIV (Barcelona, 1987), La frontera amb l'Islam en el segle XIV. Cristians i sarrai"ns 
al Pais Valencia (Barcelona, 1988), and Organitzaci6 i defensa d'un territori fron-
tere. La governaci6 d'Oriola en el segle XIV (Barcelona, 1990). 
Oliver Friggieri 
Born in Malta in 1947, he is Full Professor and Head of the Department of Mal-
tese, University of Malta. In addition to numerous scholarly articles published in 
academic journals, he has written poetry, novels short stories and critical essays 
which have been translated into a variety of languages. 
William Granara 
William Granara is Professor of the Practice of Arabic at Harvard University. He 
is former director of the Arabic Field School, American Embassy, Tunis, Tunisia; 
and director of the Centre for Arabic Study Abroad at the American University in 
Cairo. He received a Ph.D from the University of Pennsylvania in 1986 and wrote 
a dissertation on Muslim Sicily. He is the author of "Jihad and Cross Cultural En-
counter in Muslim Sicily," Harvard Middle East and Islamic Review (HMEIR), 
Spring/Fall 1996, v.4, nos. 1-2; and "Remaking Muslim Sicily: lbn Hamdis and the 
Contributors 289 
Poetics of Exile," forthcoming in EDEBIYAT. He also works on contemporary 
Arabic literature. 
Hava Lazarus-Yafeh 
Professor of Islamic Civilization at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, she is the 
author of many publications in Hebrew and English, among them Studies in Al-
Ghazali (Jerusalem, 1975) and Intertwined Worlds, Medieval Islam and Bible Criti-
cism (Princeton, 1992). In 1993 she received the distinguished Israel Prize. 
Karla Mallette 
Mallette wrote her dissertation on Sicilian literary history during the Norman 
and Hohenstaufen eras, and received a Ph.D. from the University of Toronto's 
Centre for Medieval Studies in 1998. She contributed an article on twelfth- and 
thirteenth-century Sicilian literature to the upcoming volume Cambridge History of 
Arabic Literature: Al-Anda/us. 
Manuela Marin 
Manuela Marin is a Senior Research Fellow in the Consejo Superior de lnvestiga-
ciones Cientificas, Madrid. Her fields of research include social and cultural his-
tory of al-Andalus, food in Muslim medieval societies and Arabic travel accounts. 
She is the author of Individuo y sociedad en al-Anda/us (Madrid, 1992) and the ed-
itor (with David Waines) of an anonymous medieval cook book of Egyptian origin 
(Beirut-Stuttgart, 1993), and of many articles on these subjects. 
Maria Rosa Menocal 
Appointed R. Seldon Rose Professor at Yale University, she is the author of The 
Arabic Role in Medieval Literary History: A Forgotten Heritage (1987), Writing in 
Dante's Cult of Truth from Borges to Boccaccio (1991), and Shards of Love: Exile 
and the Origins of Lyric (1993). Currently she is co-editing the Al-Andalus volume 
of theCambridge History of Arabic Literature. 
Harry T. Norris 
Professor of Arabic and Islamic Studies at the University of Leeds, he has a gen-
eral interest in Arabic language an d literature of all periods and in all Arabic 
and Muslim countries from Senegal to Singapore. Special interests include Saha-
ran studies, the history and culture of the Berbers and southern Arabia and also 
early Scandinavian history, culture and art. Among his long list of books and ar-
ticles are The Berbers in Arabic Literature (Warminister, 1977), The Arabic Con-
quest of the Western Sahara (London, 1986) and Islam in the Balkans (1994). 
Patrizia Onesta 
Born in Ancona in 1968 and graduated cum laude from the University of Macer-
ata in 1993 with her thesis in Romance Philology "La poesia d'amore in Provenza 
290 Contributors 
e in Al-Andalus. Dall'analisi al confronto" and followed this with further stud-
ies in Modem Literature (English, German and Castilian) at the same university. 
Currently she teaches Latin and Italian language and literature at the Liceo Scien-
tifico di Parabiago (Milan) and is a collaborator in the project "Leopardi e 
L'Oriente" on the occasion of the bicentennial of the birth of the poet Giacomo 
Leopardi a Recanati. 
Antonina Pellitteri 
Born in Palermo in 1949, from 1992 he has been Associate Professor of the His-
tory of Arabo-Islamic Civilization at the Faculty of Philosophy and Letters of the 
University of Palermo. He studied Arabic and Islamic literature under Professor 
Umberto Rizzitano and followed this up with study in Cairo and Damascus. 
From his research on the history of the evolution of Islamic thought in the late 
nineteenth/ early twentieth centuries he has produced II Riformismo Musulmano 
in Siria (1870-1920) (Naples, 1987), Nazionalismo Arabo Siria-Libano (1900-1950) 
(Palermo, 1992), and 3Abd al-Rahman al-Kawakibr (1835/54-1902). Nuovi materiali 
bio-bibliografici (Rome, 1996). Relative to the Islamic presence in medieval Sicily, 
he has published I Fatimiti e la Sicilia (sec. X). Materiali per uno studio sulla Sicilia 
thagr e terra di gihad con particolare riferimento a fonti ismailite dell'epoca 
(Palermo, 1997). 
Elizabeth Perez 
A recent graduate of Hampshire College, where her undergraduate thesis was enti-
tled, "Cosa Sabrosa: the Writing of Saint Teresa of Avila," she is currently a Mel-
lon Fellow in Religious Studies at the University of Chicago Divinity School. She 
has published in various journals, including the Bilingual Review, and in the an-
thology El Coro: A Chorus af Latino and Latino Poetry, published in 1998 by the 
University of Massachusetts Press and intends to focus on Afro-Caribbean reli-
gious traditions, and more specifically on those which derive from Roman 
Catholicism and Yoruba spirituality. 
Cynthia Robinson 
Cynthia Robinson received her doctorate in Art History from the University of 
Pennsylvania in 1995. The Middle East Studies Association granted her an Hon-
ourable Mention in the 1996 Malcolm H. Kerr Dissertation Compe-tition for her 
thesis on the culture of the Taifa kingdom. Currently she is an Adjunct Professor at 
the University of Pennsylvania and the New School for Social Research. 
Haun Saussy 
Haun Saussy teaches Chinese Literature and Comparative Literature, with an em-
phasis on poetics and hermeneutics, at Stanford University. His publications in-
clude a number of articles on issues of oral and literate composition, the place of 
women writers in imperial China, and problems of intercultural interpretation. 
Contributors 291 
Michael Weber 
Earned M. Div. And S. T. M. degrees from Yale, after which he worked as Campus 
Minister and part-time instructor in Religion. Earned his M.A. and Ph.D. at 
Boston University under the direction of Thomas Glick with a dissertation enti-
tled, "The Translating and Adapting of Al-Farabi's Book of the Enumeration of the 
Sciences in Spain." Currently he is Adjunct Professor of history and humanities at 
North Essex Community College and is completing a translation of the Enumera-
tion. 
Otto Zwartjes 
Since studying Spanish Philology at the University of Amsterdam and at the Uni-
versidad Compultense de Madrid, he has worked as a researcher and university 
instructor. At present he is a professor of Spanish language at the University of 
Oslo. Currently, he is working on a project concerning grammatical and linguistic 
theory in sixteenth and seventeenth-century New Spain. 


English

Contributors

Micó, María José Giménez

À la recherche de l'indentité catalane dans les romans d'Eduardo Mendoza et de Manuel Vazquez Montalbán

Burnan, Thomas E.

Exclusion or Concealment: Approaches to Traditional Arabic Exegesis in Medieval-Latin Translations of the Qur'ān

Lazarus-Yafeh, Hava

A Seventeenth-Century Hebrew Translation of the Qur'ān

Burnett, Charles

The Sortes regis Amalrici: An Arabic Divinatory Work in the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem?

Augier, Ángel

Angel Augier 
Remembering Rafael Alberti 
Rafael Alberti passed away just short of seven weeks before his ninety-
seventh birthday. It' s normal that one is always moved by the inevitable 
presence of death, and even more deeply when it's the definitive 
absence of an exceptional being who has enriched the spiritual heritage 
and social direction of his contemporaries thanks to a body of poetry 
characterized by a vigorous human authenticity, written in an exquisite 
artistic fashion, and with the example of the way he led his life. 
But independently of the natural levels of grief that this significant 
absence provoked, according to the ties that bound us to this great poet, 
it's clear that in cases like Rafael Alberti's, the joy of having had the 
privilege of living a long and generous life, of nearly a hundred years, 
should prevail over the sadness felt on his passing away. It has been a 
fortunate situation that he not only allowed us to enjoy more of the 
fruits of his genius, but also that he received during his last years signs 
of love and acknowledgment from his hometown, after having suffered 
a distressing exile that lasted four long decades. 
It was a long life that he was able to lead joyfully and conscien-
tiously, with tenderness and beauty; he made an extraordinary contri-
bution to the vast heritage of the Iberian culture, as well as to the cul-
ture of the world and to the human spirit of the past century and for 
future centuries. Rafael Alberti's life and work allow him to stay alive 
forever in the memory of humankind. 
In this the first year of the twenty-first century, which places us on 
the threshold of the centennial of his birth -December 16, 1902-, I 
wish to briefly remember Rafael Alberti on the first and last occasions 
that we were together, not only for the selfish pleasure of remembering 
him, but also to offer a small testimony of his values and some details 
of his actions and concerns, which are covered more extensively in my 
book Rafael Alberti en Cuba (Rafael Alberti in Cuba). 
In mid-April of 1935, amid a critical political situation in Cuba in 
which I was involved, I received an important political and literary 
assignment. Hardly a month before, a forceful general revolutionary 
strike against the regime, that had been installed by the United States in 
January of the previous year, had failed. This became the excuse for the 
beginning of the repressive and terrible period of the first stage of 
tyranny under Fulgencio Batista. I was assigned the difficult task of 
SCRIPTA MEDITERRANEA, Vol.XXII, 15 
16 Angel Augier 
looking after Rafael Alberti and his wife Marfa Teresa Leon, on their 
first visit to Cuba. They arrived on April 16 at the port of Havana on 
board the steamer the Siboney from New York. 
It was an assignment that had been suggested by my friend Juan 
Marinello, the eminent revolutionary intellectual, who was then unjust-
ly in jail, on account of his editorial work on behalf of the Anti-
Imperialist League of Cuba, and with whom I collaborated on the news-
paper La Palabra (The Word) under his direction; it was closed down by 
the tyrannical regime after the general strike had failed in March. 
The young poet and journalist that I was then was very pleased and 
honoured by the assignment, for I was aware of the stature of the author 
of Marinero en tierra (Sailor on Land) within the new Spanish poetry and 
of his recent political affiliation with the Communists, even though I 
had not read much of his poetry. Nevertheless, I approached the distin-
guished couple -hat was staying at the old Saratoga Hotel- under the 
supposition that I was going to meet two classic intellectuals, that is, 
possessed of a distant air of superiority and hard to please. But instead, 
I met a young charming couple, whom I have already described on 
more than one occasion: Marfa Teresa was graceful, beautiful, loqua-
cious; Rafael, dashing, affable and smartly dressed, his Andalusian flair 
clear from his easygoing smile. And any difference of age and social 
standing was erased when we addressed each other with the familiar tu 
form. 
It must be remembered that as of 1931, during the heart of the strug-
gle against the Monarchy and for the Republic in Spain, Alberti took a 
decisive stand in his life, which he wrote about at the beginning of the 
first edition of his journal Cruz y Raya (Cross and Stripe), entitled Poes(a 
1924-1930 (Poetry 1924-1930): "As of 1931, my work and my life are at 
theserviceof the Spanish Revolution and of the International proletariat." 
Even though I was aware of his stance, I did not know that his trip 
to the United States and the Caribbean fulfilled a mission on behalf of 
the International Red Cross for the Asturian miners, who were being 
brutally repressed. It's to be expected that both Spanish writers had 
been warned of the serious political situation in Cuba at the time, which 
explains their status as passengers in transit to Mexico on the Siboney, 
which periodically covered the New York-Havana-Veracruz route. Still, 
it was a risky mission, but I proudly and decisively resolved to take it on. 
Fortunately, Rafael's literary fame, and his friendship from Madrid 
with a former member of the Cuban legation in Spain, the scholar Jose 
Marfa Chacon y Calvo, the then Director of Culture for the regime, 
allowed the several weeks' stay to be relatively normal. Lectures given 
by the both of them and readings by Alberti were made possible in the 
main cultural institutions, as well as interviews and words of tribute in 
and from important press organizations. 
Remembering Rafael Alberti 17 
But apart from the literary activities and the inevitable dealings 
with a certain snobbish bourgeoisie, the spirited couple did not forego 
the pleasure of meeting the people that most interested them. The first 
contact they made was at a clandestine meeting with a group of left-
wing intellectuals in a room at the Teacher's College, which was then 
temporarily set up in a hospital that was under construction. 
About twenty writers, artists, and professors attended with the nat-
ural precaution that was required in those days of harsh political perse-
cution. Alberti spoke to us about the critical situation in Europe caused 
by the aggressive fascist policies of Hitler and Mussolini, and about the 
need to confront ideologically that advance of regimes that were threat-
ening the progress and culture of the world. He spoke of the actions 
already undertaken by French and Spanish writers and artists in de-
fence of the arts, and he urged the creation in Cuba of a similar organi-
zation linked to the European bodies; with that same objective in mind 
he and Marfa Teresa continued their trip on to Mexico. 
There was a lively conversation amongst the members of the group, 
in which the guest informed us of the reactionary crisis of that sombre 
period for the young Spanish Republic, which was not very different 
from that which many Latin American countries were suffering. At a 
particular point, Alberti asked if the poet Nicolas Guillen was in atten-
dance. I told him that he wasn't there for empty precautionary mea-
sures, on account of his having simply been an employee of an official 
department of the regime that had been deposed in 1933, but it was 
clear that his books of poetry S6ngoro cosongo and West Indies Ltd. (1931 
and 1934, respectively) were of a revolutionary nature. Alberti agreed 
with me and warmly praised what he knew of Guillen's writing. The 
next day I had the pleasure of taking Guillen, who had been a friend of 
mine from the year before, to meet Alberti and to thus begin a close and 
long friendship with Rafael and Marfa Teresa. And as of that moment, 
our poet maintained ties with the far left of the Cuban cultural commu-
nity. 
Their visits to "political prisoners" were amongst other "subver-
sive" activities undertaken by the Spanish couple that, however, did not 
overshadow the publicity they received for the readings and lectures. 
On account of being a writer, Alberti was able to have an interview with 
the imprisoned writers Juan Marinello and Jose Manuel Valdes 
Rodriguez in the Castillo del Principe jail, where they were serving an 
arbitrary six-month sentence along with the poet Regino Pedroso (ill at 
that time) and some other fellow writers, for having been members of 
the editorial board of the journal Masas (Masses), an organ of the Anti-
Imperialist League of Cuba, (which has already been mentioned). 
Further-more, both Rafael and Marfa Teresa also visited the "female 
political prisoners" (intellectuals and workers) in the Women's 
Penitentiary in Guanabacoa; the women were accused of participating 
in the recent general revolutionary strike. 
18 Angel Augier 
On several occasions I took Rafael and Marfa Teresa through Old 
Havana's narrow streets, which have retained a Spanish colonial atmos-
phere and they frequently expressed their delight at standing in places 
that reminded them of places in Cadiz; they were also excited about 
meeting the black population of Havana, their music, their joy, their 
particular way of speaking Spanish; Marfa Teresa was especially 
delighted by the black children. 
Even though there weren't many occasions to talk about literature 
when I was accompanying them, I remember one time that I asked 
Rafael what poets had influenced his poetry the most. He replied that 
more than anyone else, it had been Gil Vicente, and he went on to give 
a warm biographical sketch of the Lusa-Spanish poet, whom I did not 
know about at that time; he also mentioned, naturally, Garcilaso, 
Gongora, Juan Ramon. Alberti wrote a poem about the day he left 
Havana; 
The sky was behind me on the Caribbean sea 
The strong and pure voice of Juan Marinello, 
The unknown voice of Pedroso and the 
Wet memory of Jose Manuel. 
It was the 10th of May when the "Siboney" 
Left the Cuban palm tree for the maguey 
That the Mexican shores called on me to come, 
The open daggers, gently, to wound me. 
On that date in 1935, therefore, Rafael and Marfa Teresa left the port 
of Havana for Mexico, and we wrote to each other, especially with 
Marfa Teresa, who was always so graceful and enthusiastic. A year after 
their departure, on May 20, 1936, the charismatic poet and publisher, 
Manuel Altolaguirre, published out of his press on 73 Viriato Street in 
Madrid, Alberti's dramatic and suggestive book of poetry, entitled 13 
bandas y 48 es trellas. Poema del mar Caribe. (13 Stripes and 48 Stars. Poem of 
the Caribbean Sea). It is dedicated, as you will recall, "To Juan Marinello 
and all the anti-imperialist writers of America", and includes as an 
inscription a well intentioned line written by Ruben Dario: "~,Tantos 
millones de hombres hablaremos ingles?" ("Will so many millions of us 
speak English?"). 
That dramatic experience of a historical oppressive reality on the 
American continent, that includes the United States, Cuba, Mexico, El 
Salvador, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Panama, Venezuela, Martinique, etc. is 
one of Alberti's most impressive books of poetry. This book is crowned 
by the poem "Yo tambien canto America" ("I also sing America"), 
which is inscribed with the title of of Langston Hughes's poem "I, too, 
sing America". It is a pity that he was not able to see what he yearned 
for in the following stanza: "It's going to explode, to explode, I want to 
Remembering Rafael Alberti 19 
see it, / I want to hear it, touch it, be its catalyst, I that shake up that 
destroys / the armed intervention made by those carrying dollars. ("Va 
a sonar, va a sonar, yo quiero verlo, I quiero ofrlo, tocarlo, ser su impul-
so, Iese sacudimiento que destruya / la intervenci6n armada de los 
d6lares"). 
This poetry of condemnation and combat underlines not only the 
tragedy of our countries colonized by the dollar, but also the difficulties 
faced by Rafael and Maria Teresa vis-a-vis the pro-American tyrannic 
regimes of this hemisphere, in that disastrous period, that with the out-
standing exception of Cuba, differs relatively little from what we are 
presently experiencing. 
But Rafael and Maria Teresa, the great Spanish poet and the great 
Spanish novelist, were then far away from the enormous tragedy that 
was awaiting the heroic Spanish nation as of July 1936. The savagery, 
forseen by the Congresses for the Defense of the Arts, was unleashed by 
the monstruous Francoist-Falangist aggression that was supported by 
the Nazis and that caused the deaths, imprisonment or exile of millions 
of human beings. That criminal fascist aggression was nothing more 
than the first act of an even more catastrophic tragedy: the Second 
World War. 
The life and poetry of Rafael Alberti are marked by almost four 
decades in exile, in the same way that our lives in Cuba, in the 
Caribbean were marked by many years of constant battles against an 
unsustainable reality, that was erased in Cuba by the triumphant 
Revolution of 1959. In 1960, Rafael and Maria Teresa were guests of 
Cuba for the second time, but in what a different manner. Their exten-
sive programme of honours and visits, as well as my duties and respon-
sibilities only allowed for a short reunion full of memories. When, how-
ever, Rafael returned to Havana in 1991, Maria Teresa had already 
passed away, we were able to share a friendly discussion on several 
occasions. 
Of our unforgettable friendship there remained our correspondence 
and indelible memory of those two exemplary and unmistakeable 
human beings, of an exceptional sensibility and talent, fighting for a 
better world, who never lost their enthusiasm and hope, nor their will 
to fight. 
Skipping over the years and leaving out other occasions and 
reunions with Rafael like the one in Segovia in 1994, during the Inter-
national Conference of Leonese, Hispanic American and Portuguese 
Writers, where I presented him with the diploma as Honorary Member 
of the Nicolas Guillen Foundation-, we came upon our last reunion. 
It took place in his beautiful hometown, the Puerto de Santa Maria, part 
of the impressive bay of Cadiz in July of 1996. The Rafael Alberti 
Foundation, under the direction of his second wife, Maria Asuncion 
20 Angel Augier 
Mateo, periodically holds poetry reunions, and that year (the third edi-
tion), six of us Cuban writers were invited to participate: Fina Garcia 
Marruz and Mary Cruz in the section "La voz de siempre: Ruben 
Dario" ("The Everlasting Voice: Ruben Dario") and Cintio Vitier, Nancy 
Morejon, Jose Perez Olivares and Angel Augier in the section "Poesfa de 
la otra orilla de nuestra lengua: Cuba" ("Poetry from the Other Shore of 
Our Language: Cuba"). 
The day after our arrival, Marfa Asuncion kindly invited my wife 
Mary and me - the closest to Rafael - to visit him, but when I told her 
that all of the Cuban guests had arrived, she extended the invitation, 
which gave us an unforgettable afternoon with the customary good 
humour and surprising memory of this great Spanish and universal 
poet from Cadiz. And there, seeing his usual smile, I remembered that 
that was one of his personality traits that most impressed me in 1935, 
this last time with a slight melancholic twinge, but it was never an 
empty smile, rather the transparent smile of kindness, of the awareness 
of having fulfilled one's duty, in a life dedicated to writing poetry and 
to the poetry of his actions. 
That is why, when he died on October 28, 1999, I believed that his 
passing away could not be sad, and I wrote this sonnet that I dedicated 
to his daughter Aitana Alberti Leon, who by living in Cuba extends the 
love that her parents always felt for our country, and receives from 
Cuba the love that our country will always feel for them, and for the 
marvellous contribution they made to human awareness and world cul-
ture: 
A BROTHERLY FAREWELL TO RAFAEL ALBERTI 
Rafael, I never forget your smile, 
Since the restless light of Havana 
Embraced you along with Marfa Teresa 
And kissed you with the magic of her breeze. 
Because you are a presence that does not disappear, 
You bid farewell without sorrow or in a hurry, 
And at a distance I make out your smile 
Trying not to forget sadness. 
What you gave was beautiful, noble, and honourable: 
That enormous treasure that you leave us. 
Your farewell cannot be sad. 
In your life you fought for the joy 
Of humanity. And though you are already leaving, 
You remain forever in your poetry. 
University of Havana 
Translated by Jose N. Martinez 


Remembering Rafael Alberti

Law, Ping Mei

Pedagogical Fantasy: A Survey of the 19th Century Children's Literature in Spain

Ben-Schlomo, David

Cultural Diversity, Ethnicity and Power Imbalance in Early Iron Age Philistia

Not a member yet

Masthead

Contributors

À la recherche de l'indentité catalane dans les romans d'Eduardo Mendoza et de Manuel Vazquez Montalbán

Exclusion or Concealment: Approaches to Traditional Arabic Exegesis in Medieval-Latin Translations of the Qur'ān

A Seventeenth-Century Hebrew Translation of the Qur'ān

The Sortes regis Amalrici: An Arabic Divinatory Work in the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem?

Remembering Rafael Alberti

Pedagogical Fantasy: A Survey of the 19th Century Children's Literature in Spain

Masthead

Cultural Diversity, Ethnicity and Power Imbalance in Early Iron Age Philistia

113

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