Carlos Barral and the Struggle for Holocaust Consciousness in Franco's Spain

Abstract:This article uncovers the role of the Spanish publisher Carlos Barral in promoting knowledge of the Holocaust through a number of publishing ventures beginning in the late 1950s. Based on research in the Archivo General de la Administración, it sets Barral's endeavors in the context of the Franco regime's resistance to the public airing of Nazi crimes in Spain. After considering the historical factors that help explain why Franco's regime was reluctant to tolerate an uninhibited public awareness of the extermination of the European Jews, the article examines how and why Carlos Barral made it his duty to promote knowledge of the horrors the regime was eager to hide.