Imán

Published in 1930, Ramón J. Sender's debut novel "Imán" (Magnet) is a searing indictment of the Moroccan War (Rif War) and the disaster of Annual (1921), events that marked the final, bloody gasp of the Spanish empire. Drawing directly from his own experience as a conscript, Sender crafts a narrative that is both a brutally realistic war chronicle and a profound existential meditation on human suffering.

The novel follows Viance, a humble blacksmith from Aragon whose nickname "Imán" (Magnet) reflects his tragic propensity to attract misfortune. Through Viance's eyes, we witness the absurdity of a colonial war fought by the poor for the benefit of the rich. From the dehumanizing training camps to the hallucinatory horror of the battlefield, Viance is stripped of his humanity, reduced to a "magnet" for disaster.

Sender's prose is visceral and poetic, describing a landscape of "calcareous dryness" where men are transformed into automatons and the dead are more present than the living. The central section, detailing Viance's delirious escape from the siege of Igueriben, is a descent into hell that culminates in a grotesque rebirth inside the belly of a dead horse—a potent symbol of his return to a primordial, instinctive state.

Yet, "Imán" offers no redemption. Viance's "heroic" return is met with indifference and scorn by the very society he fought for. He finds his home village submerged under a reservoir, his past erased, and his dignity stripped away, leaving him a broken figure mocked even by those of his own class. This Stockcero edition, edited by Borja Rodríguez-Gutiérrez, illuminates the novel's powerful anti-militarist message and its critique of a submissive Spanish youth, making it a timeless exploration of the cost of war and the failure of social justice.