The Plight of Refugees in Isabel Allende’s Long Petal of The Sea

Abstract

Isabel Allende’s A Long Petal of The Sea (2020) is a well-researched novel that deals with a global issue of the refugees. It’s fictionalized history of Francisco’s regime in Spain and Pinochet’s regime in Chile. The novelist has set it in the background of 1930’s when there was the Civil War in Spain.  Many people had to leave Spain due to the Francisco Franco’s fascist government that replaced the democratic government.  The Civil War took place between the two groups, the Republicans and the fascists. Franco’s fascism unleashed an era of “hatred, vengeance and terror that was to cost Spain a million of lives” (Allende, 2020, p.23). There was repression, loss of freedom, dictatorship, violence and bloodshed.  The atrocities that were exercised not only crippled the lives of the common people but also made the survival difficult. Under such critical conditions, many people were forced to leave Spain and had to use very perilous routes to “take refuge in France” (ibid). When they entered France, the government of France treated them badly. Allende has represented the atrocities of the war and how it affects the lives of common people, causes forced migration, changes their status from free citizens into stateless people and refugees. Taking Isabell Allende’s A Long Petal of the Sea as an example, this paper examines how the war and political turmoil displace the Dalmaus, the trauma of leaving their homes, their miserable life in the refugees’ camps, their struggle for survival and finally their yearning for a home where they may live permanently and peacefully. It is a story of forced migration, sacrifice, suffering, love and loss. Such refugee stories help us understand the reasons behind large scale migration of the people in the world and provide “a view of refugees as ontological and epistemological subjects shaped by and shaping history”. (Gandhi., & Nguyen, 2023, p.4).