Roberto Bolano: Nazi Literature in the Americas

At fifteen, Edelmira Thompson published her first book, To Daddy , which earned her a modest place in the vast gallery of lady poets active in Buenos Aires high society. And from then on, she was a regular presence in the salons of Ximena San Diego and Susana Lezcano Lafinur, dictators of taste in poetry, and of taste in general, on both banks of the Río de la Plata at the dawn of the twentieth century. Her first poems, as one might reasonably have guessed, were concerned with filial piety, religious meditation and gardens. She flirted with the idea of taking the veil. She learned to ride.

In 1917 she met the rancher and entrepreneur Sebastian Mendiluce, twenty years her senior. Everyone was surprised when they announced their engagement, after only a few months. According to people who knew him at the time, Mendiluce thought little of literature in general and poetry in particular, had no artistic sensibility (although he did occasionally go to the opera), and his conversation was on a par with that of his farmhands and factory workers. He was tall and energetic, but not handsome by any means. There was, however, no disputing his inexhaustible wealth.

Edelmira Thompson’s friends considered it a marriage of convenience, but in fact she married for love. A love that neither she nor Mendiluce was ever able to explain and which endured imperturbably all the days of her life.

Marriage, which ends the careers of so many promising women writers, quickened the pen of Edelmira Thompson. She established a salon in Buenos Aires to rival those of the redoubtable Ximena San Diego and Susana Lezcano Lafinur. She took young Argentinean painters under her wing, not only buying their work (in 1950 her collection of paintings and sculptures was, if not the best in the Republic, certainly one of the largest and most extravagant), but also inviting them to paint at her ranch in Azul, far from the madding crowd, all expenses paid. She founded a publishing house, The Lamp of the South, which brought out more than fifty books of poetry, many of which were dedicated to Edelmira herself, “the fairy godmother of Argentinean letters.”

In 1921 she published her first book of prose, All My Life , an idyllic and rather flat autobiography, devoid of gossip, full of landscapes and poetic meditations. Contrary to the author’s expectations, it disappeared from the bookshop windows in Buenos Aires without leaving so much as a ripple. Disappointed, Edelmira set off for Europe with her two small sons, two servants, and more than twenty suitcases.

She visited Lourdes and the great cathedrals. She had an audience with the Pope. A yacht took her from island to island in the Aegean. She reached Crete one midday in spring. In 1922, in Paris, she published a book of children’s verse in French, and another in Spanish. Then she returned to Argentina.

But things had changed, and Edelmira did not feel at ease in her country. Her new book of poems ( European Hours , 1923) was described in a local newspaper as “precious.” The nation’s most influential reviewer, Dr. Enrique Belmar, described her as “an idle, childish lady whose time and energy would be better spent on good works, such as educating all the ragged little rascals on the loose throughout this vast land of ours.” Edelmira’s elegant reply consisted of an invitation to attend her salon, addressed to Belmar and other critics, which was ignored by all but four half-starved gossip columnists and crime reporters. Humiliated, she retired to her ranch in Azul, accompanied by a faithful few. Soothed by the rural calm and the conversations of simple, hardworking country folk, she set to work on the new book of poetry that was to be her vindication. Argentinean Hours (1925) sparked scandal and controversy from the day of its publication. In her new poems, Edelmira renounced contemplative vision in favor of pugnacious action. She attacked Argentina’s critics and literary ladies, the decadence besetting the nation’s cultural life. She argued for a return to origins: agrarian labor and the still-wild southern frontier. Flirting and swooning were behind her now. Edelmira longed for the epic and its proportions, a literature unafraid to face the challenge of singing the fatherland. One way and another, the book was a great success, but, demonstrating her humility, Edelmira barely took the time to relish her triumph, and soon left for Europe once again. She was accompanied by her children, her servants, and the Buenos Aires philosopher Aldo Carozzone, who acted as her personal secretary.

She spent the year 1926 traveling in Italy with her numerous entourage. In 1927, she was joined by Mendiluce. In 1928, her first daughter, Luz, a bouncing, ten-pound baby, was born in Berlin. The German philosopher Haushofer was godfather to the child, and the baptism, attended by the cream of the German and Argentinean intelligentsia, was followed by three days of non-stop festivities, which culminated in a little wood near Rathenow, where the Mendiluces treated Haushofer to a kettledrum solo composed and performed by maestro Tito Vásquez, who went on to become a sensation.

In 1929, the stock-market crash obliged Sebastian Mendiluce to return to Argentina. Meanwhile Edelmira and her children were presented to Adolf Hitler, who held Luz and said, “She certainly is a wonderful little girl.” Photos were taken. The future Führer of the Reich made a great impression on the Argentinean poet. Before leaving, she presented him with several of her own books and a deluxe edition of Martin Fierro . Hitler thanked her warmly, beseeching her to translate one of her poems into German on the spot, a task which, with the help of Carozzone, she managed to accomplish. Hitler was clearly delighted. The lines were resounding and looked to the future. In high spirits, Edelmira asked for the Führer’s advice: which would be the most appropriate school for her sons? He recommended a Swiss boarding school, but added that the best school was life itself. By the end of the audience, Edelmira and Carozzone were committed Hitlerites.

1930 was a year of voyages and adventures. Accompanied by Carozzone, her young daughter (the boys were boarding at an exclusive school in Berne) and her two Indian servants, Edelmira traveled up and down the Nile, visited Jerusalem (where she had a mystical experience or a nervous breakdown, which confined her to a hotel bed for three days), then Damascus, Baghdad. .

Her head was buzzing with projects: she planned to launch a new publishing house back in Buenos Aires, which would specialize in translations of European thinkers and novelists; she dreamed of studying architecture and designing grandiose schools to be built in parts of the country as yet untouched by civilization; she wanted to set up a foundation in memory of her mother, with the mission of helping young women from poor backgrounds to fulfill their artistic aspirations. And little by little a new book began to take shape in her mind.

In 1931 she returned to the Argentinean capital and began to carry out her projects. She launched a magazine, Modern Argentina , edited by Carozzone, whose mission was to publish the latest in poetry and fiction, but also political commentary, philosophical essays, film reviews, and articles on social issues. Half of the first number was devoted to Edelmira’s book The New Spring , which came out simultaneously. Part travel narrative, part philosophical memoir, the book reflected on the state of the world, and the destinies of Europe and America in particular, while warning of the threat that Communism posed to Christian civilization.