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lasted no more than a month. The Page’s
career continued for some time, although his glory days were over. Losing the
libel cases was a rude awakening; then he was sacked by the
Peruvian Evening
News
, which offered him up as a propitiatory victim to placate both a
beer magnate of indigenous origins and the secretary of a certain ministry whom
Cepeda had publicly taken to task for his ineptitude (which was widely
acknowledged and admitted).
He did not publish any more books.
In his final years he relied on
Panorama
and stints of radio
journalism. He also worked occasionally as a copy-editor. Initially he was
surrounded by a small group of admirers, known as The Pages, but gradually time
dispersed them. In 1982, he returned to Arequipa, where he set up a small fruit
store. He died of a stroke in the spring of 1986.
WANDERING WOMEN
OF LETTERS
I RMA C ARRASCO
Puebla, Mexico, 1910–Mexico City, 1966
A Mexican poet inclined to
mysticism and tormented phraseology. At the age of twenty she published her
first collection of verse,
The Voice You Withered
, which bears witness
to a stubborn and sometimes fanatical reading of Sor Juana Inez de la Cruz.
Her grandparents and parents were supporters of Porfírio Díaz. Her
elder brother was a priest who embraced the cause of the Cristeros and was
executed by firing squad in 1928. In her 1933 collection,
The Destiny of
Women
, she confessed that she was in love with God, Life and a New
Mexican Dawn, to which she also referred indiscriminately as
resurrection,
awakening, dreaming, falling in love, forgiveness
and
marriage
.
Being open-minded, she frequented the salons of Mexican high society
as well as the haunts of the avant-garde, where her charm and frankness
immediately won over the revolutionary painters and writers, who welcomed her
warmly although they were well aware of her conservative ideas.
In 1934 she published
The Paradox of the Cloud
, fifteen
sonnets in the style of Góngora, and
A Tableau of Volcanoes
, a series
of highly personal poems, specimens of Catholic feminism
avant la
lettre
. She was boundlessly prolific. Her optimism was contagious. Her
personality was delightful. She radiated beauty and serenity.
In 1935, after a five-month engagement, which at the time was
considered too short, she married Gabino Barreda, an architect from Hermosillo,
Sonora, who was also a semi-covert Stalinist and a notorious Don Juan. They
spent their honeymoon in the Sonora desert, where both husband and wife found
the lonely expanses inspiring.
On their return, they moved into a colonial house in Coyoacán, which,
thanks to Barreda, became the first colonial house with steel and glass walls.
Outwardly they made an enviable couple: both were young; they were not short of
money; Barreda was the prototype of the brilliant, idealistic architect, with
grand plans for the new cities of the continent; while Irma was the prototype of
the beautiful, upper-class woman, self-assured and proud, but also intelligent
and serene, endowed with the ballast of good sense required to keep a marriage
of artists on an even keel.
Real life, however, was a different matter, and for Irma it was not
without disappointments. Barreda cheated on her with common chorus girls. He had
no time for niceties and beat her almost every day. He used to put her down in
public, and held her family in contempt, referring to them, in conversations
with friends and strangers, as “a bunch of Cristero assholes . . . good for
nothing except target practice.” Real life can sometimes bear an unsettling
resemblance to nightmares.
In 1937 the couple traveled to Spain. Barreda went to save the
Republic, Irma to save her marriage. In Madrid, while Franco’s air support
bombed the city, in room 304 of the Hotel Splendor, Irma was subjected to the
most brutal beating of her life.
The next day, without a word to her husband, she left the Spanish
capital, bound for Paris. A week later Barreda set off in search of her,
career continued for some time, although his glory days were over. Losing the
libel cases was a rude awakening; then he was sacked by the
Peruvian Evening
News
, which offered him up as a propitiatory victim to placate both a
beer magnate of indigenous origins and the secretary of a certain ministry whom
Cepeda had publicly taken to task for his ineptitude (which was widely
acknowledged and admitted).
He did not publish any more books.
In his final years he relied on
Panorama
and stints of radio
journalism. He also worked occasionally as a copy-editor. Initially he was
surrounded by a small group of admirers, known as The Pages, but gradually time
dispersed them. In 1982, he returned to Arequipa, where he set up a small fruit
store. He died of a stroke in the spring of 1986.
WANDERING WOMEN
OF LETTERS
I RMA C ARRASCO
Puebla, Mexico, 1910–Mexico City, 1966
A Mexican poet inclined to
mysticism and tormented phraseology. At the age of twenty she published her
first collection of verse,
The Voice You Withered
, which bears witness
to a stubborn and sometimes fanatical reading of Sor Juana Inez de la Cruz.
Her grandparents and parents were supporters of Porfírio Díaz. Her
elder brother was a priest who embraced the cause of the Cristeros and was
executed by firing squad in 1928. In her 1933 collection,
The Destiny of
Women
, she confessed that she was in love with God, Life and a New
Mexican Dawn, to which she also referred indiscriminately as
resurrection,
awakening, dreaming, falling in love, forgiveness
and
marriage
.
Being open-minded, she frequented the salons of Mexican high society
as well as the haunts of the avant-garde, where her charm and frankness
immediately won over the revolutionary painters and writers, who welcomed her
warmly although they were well aware of her conservative ideas.
In 1934 she published
The Paradox of the Cloud
, fifteen
sonnets in the style of Góngora, and
A Tableau of Volcanoes
, a series
of highly personal poems, specimens of Catholic feminism
avant la
lettre
. She was boundlessly prolific. Her optimism was contagious. Her
personality was delightful. She radiated beauty and serenity.
In 1935, after a five-month engagement, which at the time was
considered too short, she married Gabino Barreda, an architect from Hermosillo,
Sonora, who was also a semi-covert Stalinist and a notorious Don Juan. They
spent their honeymoon in the Sonora desert, where both husband and wife found
the lonely expanses inspiring.
On their return, they moved into a colonial house in Coyoacán, which,
thanks to Barreda, became the first colonial house with steel and glass walls.
Outwardly they made an enviable couple: both were young; they were not short of
money; Barreda was the prototype of the brilliant, idealistic architect, with
grand plans for the new cities of the continent; while Irma was the prototype of
the beautiful, upper-class woman, self-assured and proud, but also intelligent
and serene, endowed with the ballast of good sense required to keep a marriage
of artists on an even keel.
Real life, however, was a different matter, and for Irma it was not
without disappointments. Barreda cheated on her with common chorus girls. He had
no time for niceties and beat her almost every day. He used to put her down in
public, and held her family in contempt, referring to them, in conversations
with friends and strangers, as “a bunch of Cristero assholes . . . good for
nothing except target practice.” Real life can sometimes bear an unsettling
resemblance to nightmares.
In 1937 the couple traveled to Spain. Barreda went to save the
Republic, Irma to save her marriage. In Madrid, while Franco’s air support
bombed the city, in room 304 of the Hotel Splendor, Irma was subjected to the
most brutal beating of her life.
The next day, without a word to her husband, she left the Spanish
capital, bound for Paris. A week later Barreda set off in search of her,
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