Imagine you’re an ordinary guy, a writer and editor, say, who has a relatively low public profile but who is deeply committed to a political cause. Then imagine that one day you are plucked from your life of books and culture and are instantly transformed into a...

A few months ago, production company PBS invited me to contribute to a documentary they were making about Francisco Franco as part of their 'Dictators Rulebook' series. The series has now been shown on the National Geographic channel and is well worth watching (and...

Has there ever been such a sudden, passionate love affair between a city and a newcomer as that between Madrid and James Rhodes? The pianist-writer moved to Spain last year with an armful of hit classical albums, two bestselling books and a dodgy command of the...

"You shouldn’t mistake voting for democracy" - Jonathan Bernstein So, off he goes. Mariano Rajoy, the man nobody could move, Spain’s political pachyderm, has been unseated. During his nearly seven years in power an aura had built up around the Galician: that no matter...

February 25th is the anniversary of the death of Paco de Lucía, the greatest flamenco guitarist of modern times and, for many, the greatest who ever lived. I wrote the following essay a couple of years ago about Paco de Lucía, the modernist and traditionalist tensions...

The brother-in-law, or cuñado, holds a prominent, yet unenviable, position in Spanish society, transcending the realms of the family tree to become something more than just a relative. He’s a symbol, a social phenomenon, a state of mind. The exact characteristics of...

5. Irene Montero. It’s been a funny old year for Podemos. The party began 2017 hobbled by infighting as its two most prominent figures, Pablo Iglesias and Íñigo Errejón, battled for its soul. Iglesias emerged as the winner and his deputy was banished to a lesser role,...

  “Because we are right! And because we are strong!” – Lluís Companys “Let’s not go to sleep dreaming of Scotland only to wake up in Ulster.” – Lluís Rabell In early October I met up with a Catalan friend in a café in Barcelona. It had been a while since I had...

BBC Radio 4's excellent Profile programme turned its witty and incisive gaze on Spain's prime minister recently. I was among those asked to contribute, along with Miguel-Anxo Murado and Rajoy biographer Antón Losada.  

Spain has suffered two jihadist terror attacks over the last 13 years. In March 2004, bombs planted on trains in Madrid killed 191 people and in the days that followed, hundreds of thousands of Spaniards turned out onto the streets to express their condemnation of the...