Protestant Perspectives on Ireland:

Farewell Spain: Kate O’Brien’s Elegy to War-torn Spain

“…What was seemingly intended as an encouraging exhortation to the Spanish Republicans to hold out against their enemies was actually the battle-cry of the Nationalists. Walshe regards O'Brien's use of this slogan as the heading of a chapter in which she denounces Franco as "unfortunate 75 ", while a contemporary reviewer for the Spectator sees it as evidence of her wavering support for the Republican Popular Front government 76 . Yet, it is feasible that she deliberately employed it to convey her doubts about a Republican victory and her vacillation between hope and despair 77 .…”

“…Nor is there any record of Farewell Spain having been censored in Spain or of any requests for permission to publish a Spanish translation having been submitted to the authorities 85 . Walshe's suggestion that "there would have been no official Nationalist censorship in place to ban it 86 " during the Spanish Civil War is questionable; the pro-Nationalist Irish journalist Francis McCullagh reported on the rigid censorship which foreign journalists' press articles were subjected to in Nationalist Spain in his eyewitness account of the Spanish Civil War 87 . It is more likely a case of selfcensorship, i.e.…”