Seville [antikvár]

PROLOGUE HYMN TO SEVILLE w hat I would like to do with the text of this book is to make it sound like the Song of Songs. Without biblical pretensions of course, although it is a bibliographical reference; nor with the idea of composing the most beautiful song in the world, which would be vain and presumptuous. Rather, in aU modesty, I simply wish to sing one more song among the many literary or artistic offerings which over the course of history have been dedicated to this unique city. Or like the town crier, make a brief public announcement of its virtues, its flesh and blood, its splendid soul, its charming essence, svich as I see, intuit or simply understand them. Consequently, there is no point in searching these pages for original scholarship or for the scientific results of professional research. ThLs is simply because I am neither an historian nor a learned scholar. It is also not my intention to write a tourist guidebook about the place which Jose Maria Izquierdo calls "the city of charm". There are many good ones here and there is no ([uestion of my competing or trying to intrude. Furthermore, the city's charm is dispensed freely, without the need for following beaten paths. It is enough to wander the streets of Seville and lose oneself among its prodigious corners and the rest will come in dvie course. Without any chauvinistic narcissisms, this book can be seen as a shady path through the suffocating August heat of an absorbing world; a jjath which can lead the stroller to a calm, fresh and serene contemplation of the jjhysical beauty captured in the photograjihs by this (;ameraman-cum-artist, who is none other than Juan Antonio Fernández Durán. I fancy that in order to accomplish this, I must try to pave the path with words, bordered l)y flower beds and myrtle bushes, which can fulfill the same function as a Sevillian convent: the silent and inner ])assage towards the trancelike atlmiration of esthetic l)eauty. If I am able to help the reader "listen" to the silences of Seville or to enjoy its beautiful oasis surrounded on all sides l)y hostile deserts, I \vill be satisfied. Seville will do the rest Jjy itself.