But when I see an actual flesh and blood worker in conflict with his natural enemy the policeman I do not have to ask myself which side I am on. ibid.
The horrible atmosphere produced by fear, suspicion, hatred, censored newspapers, crammed jails, enormous food queues, and prowling gangs of armed men. ibid.
A vague feeling that the revolution had been sabotaged. ibid.
There are occasions when it pays better to fight and be beaten than not to fight at all. ibid.
The Spanish anarchists – they have been systematically denigrated. ibid.
The fact is that every war suffers a kind of progressive degradation with every month that it continues, because such things as individual liberty and a truthful press are simply not compatible with military efficiency. ibid.
They laid me down again while somebody fetched a stretcher. As soon as I knew that the bullet had gone clean through my neck I took it for granted that I was done for. I had never heard of a man or an animal getting a bullet through the middle of the neck and surviving it. The blood was dribbling out of the corner of my mouth. ‘The artery’s gone,’ I thought. I wondered how long you last when your carotid artery is cut; not many minutes, presumably. Everything was very blurry. There must have been about two minutes during which I assumed that I was killed. And that too was interesting – I mean it is interesting to know what your thoughts would be at such a time. My first thought, conventionally enough, was for my wife. My second was a violent resentment at having to leave this world which, when all is said and done, suits me so well. I had time to feel this very vividly. The stupid mischance infuriated me. The meaningless of it! To be bumped off, not even in battle, but in this stale corner of the trenches, thanks to a moment’s carelessness! I thought too, of the man who shot me – wondered what he was like, whether he was a Spaniard or a foreigner, whether he knew he had got me, and so forth. I could not feel any resentment against him. I reflected that as he was a fascist I would have killed him if I could, but that if he had been taken prisoner and brought before me at this moment I would merely have congratulated him on his good shooting. It may be, though that if you were really dying your thoughts would be quite different. ibid.
This was not a round-up of criminals: it was merely a reign of terror. ibid.
The industrial towns were far away, a smudge of smoke and misery hidden by the curve of the earth’s surface. Down here it was still the England I had known in my childhood: the railway-cuttings smothered in wild flowers, the deep meadows where the great shining horses browse and meditate, the slow-moving streams bordered by willows, the green bosoms of the elms, the larkspurs in the cottage gardens; and then the huge peaceful wilderness of outer London, the barges on the miry river, the familiar streets, the posters telling of cricket matches and Royal weddings, the men in bowler hats, the pigeons in Trafalgar Square, the red buses, the blue policemen — all sleeping the deep, deep sleep of England, from which I sometimes fear that we shall never wake till we are jerked out of it by the roar of bombs. ibid.
The fundamental guarantee which gives sense to any system is that the citizens may decide and that decision is not a crime. Two Catalonias, Cales Puigdemont, Netflix 2018
The Spanish government sends 10,000 agents to impede the referendum. ibid. caption
Police in Spain today unleashed a violent crackdown on Catalans trying to vote for independence. ibid. television news
We hereby establish the Catalan Republic as an independent and sovereign state. ibid. Catalan parliament lady
In Catalonia we’ve often been treated as a Spanish colony: our language was forbidden, our democratic institutions abolished. ibid. Quim Torra
With the odds against them, with all the prohibitions, thousands of people organise themselves and manage to open hundreds of polling stations and make sure that the ballot boxes arrive and allow the vote to happen in a peaceful and exemplary way. It was empowerment of the people. ibid. Ada Colau, Alcaldesa de Barcelona
Suddenly, all that rationality goes away and something short circuits their minds and people instantly become very very entrenched in their positions to an almost fanatical degree. ibid. English journalist in Spain
In Catalonia and the Basque country in particular calls for independence grew louder. The Truth About Franco: Spain’s Forgotten Dictator I: The Rise to Power, PBS 2019
It was not until July 1938 that the decisive battle took place … A river in south-west Catalonia … one of the most brutal of the entire war. ibid.