Bogotá, March 1. Former Colombian Minister of Education Alejandro Gaviria assured on Wednesday that his latest book “I don’t expect to make this trip” reflects his vision of four humanists whom he considers “spiritual heroes”.
This was expressed by Gaviria in a conversation with the writer Ricardo Silva Romero at the Gimnasio Moderno school in Bogotá, where he was received with a round of applause and in which part of the public followed the dialogue standing up because he there were no chairs.
Gaviria tells from his experiences and reflections on politics, the “evenings” of the writers Stefan Zweig (Vienna 1881-Petrópolis -Brasil- 1942) and the Colombian Germán Arciniégas (Bogotá 1900-Bogotá 1999).
It also traces the life of Belgian painter and illustrator Frans Masereel and Austrian art critic Walter Engel.
The former health minister, also a former health minister, felt they agreed on “defending freedom in the midst of madness and their reliance on art as a form of resistance, as a counterweight to the irrational, to fanaticism and destruction”.
He pointed out that Zweig had met Arciniegas when the Colombian held a diplomatic post in Buenos Aires and that he even invited him to Bogotá to accompany him in his possession as Minister of Education, a post he has occupied between 1941-1942.
He said that Arciniegas even gave Zweig a book in which he told the life of the Spanish conquistador Gonzalo Jiménez de Quesada and that he suggested that he change the title and call it “The Knight of El Dorado”. , according to her daughter, Gabriela’s stories. .
He also recounted that during his trip to South America he had read “Los comuneros” by Arciniegas on the ship, with whom he had an important correspondence.
“We Colombians internally have not yet succeeded in consolidating the peace process, and it is for this reason that this book comes to us at the best time, when we must learn and assimilate the great legacy of Zweig in terms of otherness, respect and empathy. Peace and education are just a project,” says writer Mario Mendoza in the prologue to the book.
Gaviria ceased to be Minister of Education last Monday due to a decision by Colombian President Gustavo Petro, in which he also succeeded Culture, Patricia Ariza, and Sports, María Isabel Urrutia. EFE
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