Paradox, King by Pío Baroja

First published:Paradox, rey, 1906 (English translation, 1931)

Type of work: Novel

Type of plot: Social satire

Time of plot: Early twentieth century

Locale: Spain; Tangier; Bu-Tata, Africa

Principal characters

• Silvestre Paradox, a modern adventurer
• Avelino Diz, his skeptical friend
• Arthur Sipsom, an English manufacturer
• Eichthal Thonelgeben, a scientist
• Hardibrás, a disabled soldier
• Ugú, a friendly black man
• Bagú, a jealous medicine man
• Funangue, greedy prime minister of Bu-Tata

The Story:

After many adventures, Dr. Silvestre Paradox, a short, chubby man of about forty-five years, settles in a small Valencian town. Tiring at last of his quiet life, he announces one morning to his friend, Avelino Diz, his intention of taking a trip to Cananí, on the Gulf of Guinea. A British banker, Abraham Wolf, is setting out on his yacht Cornucopia with a party of scientists and explorers to establish a Jewish colony in Africa, and he has invited Paradox to go with him. Paradox suggests that Diz join the expedition.

In Tangier they meet several other members of the party, including General Pérez, his daughter Dora, and a disabled, scarred soldier named Hardibrás. They drink to the success of the venture with whiskey. When someone in the party feeds whiskey to a rooster, the fowl breaks into human speech and deplores what humans drink. Paradox declares that only nature is just and honorable. He is eager to go where people live naturally.

The group boards the yacht, Hardibrás swinging himself aboard by the hook he wears in place of his lost hand. There, Paradox and Diz meet others of the expedition: Mingote, a revolutionist who had tried to assassinate the king of Portugal; Pelayo, who had been Paradox’s secretary until his employer fired him for crooked dealings; Sipsom, an English manufacturer; Miss Pich, a feminist writer and former ballet dancer; and The Cheese Kid, a former French cancan dancer. Wolf himself is not on board. He is conferring with Monsieur Chabouly, a French chocolate king who also is emperor of Western Nigritia, in an attempt to establish peaceful diplomatic relations between Chabouly’s domain and the new state of Cananí.

The yacht heads out to sea. On the third day, stormy waves wash the captain overboard. The mate and the crew are drunk, so Paradox and two others are forced to take over the yacht. Paradox, alone at the wheel, converses with the wind and the sea, who tell him that they have wills of their own. Yock, his dog, admires his master’s resolution and strength and declares that he is almost worthy of being a dog.

As the storm increases in fury, the mast breaks and crashes upon the deck. Paradox calls the passengers together and suggests that one of them, Goizueta, be appointed captain because of his maritime experience. Goizueta is elected. His first act, after saving one bottle of brandy for medicine, is to throw the rest of the alcohol overboard.

For a week they sail through heavy fog that never lifts to reveal their position. At last the ship’s coal runs out, and they drift. One night some of the passengers and crew, Miss Pich, Mingote, and Pelayo among them, steal the only lifeboat and desert the ship.

When the fog lifts, the passengers see a beach not far away. The yacht strikes a rock, but all are able to save themselves on rafts that they load with supplies from the ship. The next morning the yacht breaks up, leaving the party marooned on an island. It is then proposed that Paradox be put in charge. After modestly protesting, he accepts and assigns jobs to all the survivors. Nevertheless, he fails to make provisions for their defense. The next night a band of islanders arrive in two canoes, surprise the sleepers, and take them bound to Bu-Tata.

The first demand made by Prime Minister Funangue is for rum. One of the party, Sipsom, explains that they can provide rum only if they are allowed to return to their base of supplies. In his greed, Funangue decides to ignore the advice of Bagú, the medicine man, who wants all the whites of the marooned yacht slain. A friendly islander, Ugú, is assigned to instruct the prisoners in tribal language and customs. From Ugú the captives learn Bagú’s prejudices and superstitions. When the witch doctor later appears, Sipsom declares that one of the prisoners is a wizard fated to die on the same day as Bagú. If Bagú sides with them, however, the white magician will help the medicine man to marry Princess Mahu, King Kiri’s daughter. Bagú accepts the proposal.

King Kiri, engaged in his favorite pastime of killing subjects whom he dislikes, pauses in his diversion long enough to receive the prisoners. After a conversation about vested interests, he orders that their lives be spared. Giving them permission to get supplies from their camp, he dispatches them under guard in two canoes. During the trip, the prisoners, having lulled the suspicions of the guards, are about to take their guns and free themselves, but Paradox objects. He says that he has other plans. Diz scoffs at the way his friend puts on airs.

After damaging one canoe, the prisoners use the delay to impress the locals, who are black, with their white superiority by working magic tricks. A Frenchman in the party leads a discussion on the rights of individuals. The scheme works. After two weeks, the blacks agree to desert their king and accompany the whites to Fortunate Island, a defensible plateau suggested by Ugú. Although Paradox preaches the virtues of life out of doors, the others build Fortune House, a communal dwelling.

When King Kiri’s army appears, Paradox’s machine gun quickly repulses them, and a searchlight finally puts the blacks to flight. Peace has finally come to Fortune House. The blacks construct huts and spend their evenings at magic lantern shows. The Fortune House Herald begins publication.

Prime Minister Funangue and two attendants, appearing under a flag of truce, bring King Kiri’s appeal for help. The Fulani are attacking Bu-Tata. Paradox and Thonelgeben, the engineer, return to the capital with the blacks. At Paradox’s suggestion, the river is dynamited to turn Bu-Tata into an island. Bagú objects to such interference with nature and discusses the change with fish, serpents, and frogs. Only the bat refuses to voice an opinion.

One day, warriors from Bu-Tata appear at Fortune House with the head of King Kiri and beg one of the whites to become their ruler. At a meeting, all debate monarchial theories. When they fail to agree, Sipsom shows Paradox to the blacks and announces that he has been chosen by popular vote. The blacks then return to Bu-Tata for a coronation feast.

By this time, Paradox, who has reconciled to the advantages of civilization over life close to nature, becomes tired of Africa. At a session of Congress he argues against state support of art and criticizes formal education. Pelayo and Mingote, captured by Moors after the storm, arrive in Bu-Tata. Miss Pich had been raped by locals, and the others had been eaten.

Political life continues. Two white couples are married. Sipsom holds law court and gives judgment in complicated cases. Then the French capture Bu-Tata and burn it. The whites are released at the request of The Cheese Kid. Bagú is shot.

Three years later an epidemic fills the Bu-Tata Hospital. French doctors declare that the outbreak is the result of civilization, for one of the doctors had unknowingly taken smallpox to a local village while fighting another epidemic. Civilization has also driven Princess Mahu to dancing nude in a nightclub. As an enterprising journalist states regarding Bu-Tata, the French army had brought civilization to that “backward” country.

Bibliography

Barrow, Leo L. Negation in Baroja: A Key to His Novelistic Creativity. Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 1971. Explores the novelist’s technique of “creating by destroying,” an approach he shares with other modern writers who rebel against conventional Western values. Discusses the style, dialogue, atmosphere, characterization, and landscape in Paradox, King and other novels to explain Baroja’s philosophical, political, and social attitudes.

Landeira, Ricardo. The Modern Spanish Novel, 1898-1936. Boston: Twayne, 1985. A chapter on Baroja surveys the novelist’s achievements and discusses Paradox, King and the other novels in the trilogy dealing with “The Fantastic Life.” Calls the novel the bitterest of the three in attacking social ills.

Murphy, Katharine. Re-Reading Pío Baroja and English Literature. New York: Peter Lang, 2004. Murphy points out the many structural similarities between Baroja’s early fiction and the novels of his contemporaries, most notably Joseph Conrad, Thomas Hardy, E. M. Forster, and James Joyce. Focuses on how Baroja treats human consciousness; the identity and role of the artist; European landscapes; and questions of form, genre, and representation.

Patt, Beatrice P. Pío Baroja. New York: Twayne, 1971. Excellent introduction to the writer and his works. Briefly discusses Baroja’s attitudes toward the Church and state. Reviews Baroja’s use of extended dialogue in Paradox, King, and points out how it permits him to introduce personal prejudices into a work he considered “half-fantasy, half-satirical poem.”

Turner, Harriet, and Adelaida López de Martínez, eds. The Cambridge Companion to the Spanish Novel: From 1600 to the Present. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2003. This collection of essays tracing the development of the Spanish novel includes a discussion of Baroja and some of his works that situate him within the broader context of Spanish literature.