In times past, those persecuted in their homeland found solace elsewhere. Where to take refuge now, when intolerance is on the rise? The United States, a promised land for the poor and dissenters, is raising containment walls. Europe, a symbol of peace and freedom, is fortifying its borders. Deceit that tarnishes humanist traditions and emblematic cultural essences that even Franco's totalitarianism did not violate. Examples: two prominent American writers settled in Spain, like others in France, fleeing the shameful racism to live with dignity.
Chester Himes has rested in the cemetery of Benisa (Alicante) since 1984, a celebrated African American author, an icon of the 'crime genre' alongside Dashiell Hammet and Raymond Chandler. He was born in Jefferson City (Missouri, 1909); expelled from university, he was imprisoned for theft in 1928. Writing in prison, he published his first story in 1934. Released, he worked in precarious jobs. His successful first novel, 'If He Hollers, Let Him Go' (1945), allowed him to dedicate himself to literature, characterised by the denunciation of political and social discrimination. His most celebrated books narrate everyday life on the streets of Harlem through the fatalistic perspective and sarcastic humour of detectives Coffin Johnson and Grave Digger Jones: 'For Love of Imabelle', 'All Dead', 'The Big Gold Dream', 'Cotton Comes to Harlem' or 'A Blind Man with a Gun'. Like Ernest Hemingway, Richard Wright or James Baldwin, he resided in Paris from 1953. He settled in Moraira in 1969.
José Manuel Lara, founder of the Planeta Group, acknowledged that 'While the City Sleeps' consolidated his business project. Its author: Frank Yerby (Augusta, Georgia, 1916), son of an African American and a Scottish woman, had been living in Spain since 1955. His racial condition caused him early problems in the "Deep America" dominated by the Ku Klux Klan. He won an important award in 1944 with a story published in 'Harper's'; two years later, that book would become the first 'best seller' by a black writer. Fed up with racism, he lived in France from 1952. His marriage to a Spanish woman settled him in Madrid, where he would die in 1991. A precursor of the 'historical novel' with unforgettable titles: 'The Griffin's Way', 'Black Are the Gods of My Africa', 'Human Passions' or 'My Gods Have Died in Mississippi'. Would these pioneers of integration have hope today?♦
