This article was written by Joni Rendon
Never before-and possibly never since-has a Mediterranean island inspired as much enmity as did the Spanish isle of Majorca for prolific French writer and protofeminist George Sand during the inhospitable winter of 1838. Her ill-fated stay there, which later became the subject of her book Winter in Majorca, was to have deleterious and far-reaching consequences for both the novelist and her famous companion, composer Fredric Chopin.
Setting foot on Majorcan soil more than a century and a half later, my visit blessedly turns up not a shred of evidence regarding the unfriendly locals, terrible food, and inclement weather that so tormented Sand during her stay. In fact, to the contrary, I come away knowing that this is a place I'll be returning to again and again.
Most pleasing of all was my discovery that the Majorcan winter, far from being the bleak, damp affair experienced by Sand, routinely brings daytime temperatures requiring nary a sweater, along with a seemingly omnipresent sun (indeed, the island claims an average of 300 days of sunshine annually). No doubt, this was the Majorca that Sands had sought when she and Chopin left France in search of a temperate retreat for her rheumatism-afflicted son.
Chopin, Sand and her two young children, the product of an unhappy marriage that had ended in divorce, departed in early November brimming with optimism. "Our journey," wrote the author to her friend Carlotta Marliani, "seems to begin under the most favorable conditions." Embarking from Barcelona on November 7th, 1838, for the overnight passage aboard the "El Mallorqn" ferry, they could not have imagined they'd be making the reverse trip under dire circumstances just 98 days later.
Advertisement:
