Tomorrow Perhaps the Future

Writers, Outsiders, and the Spanish Civil War

By: Sarah Watling

Narrated by: Sarah Watling

A NEW YORKER BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR • An extraordinary account of the women artists and activists whose determination to live—and to create—with courage and conviction took them as far as the Spanish Civil War

“Now, as certainly as never before, we are determined or compelled, to take sides.”—Nancy Cunard

An attempted insurrection, a country divided, a democracy threatened. It was the Spanish Civil War of 1936, surprisingly, that Sarah Watling found herself drawn to when confounded by the tumultuous politics of our present day. This was a conflict that galvanized tens of thousands of volunteers from around the world to join the fight. For them, the choice seemed clear: either you were for fascism or you were against it.

Seeking to understand how they knew that the moment to act had arrived, Watling sifts through archives for lost journals, letters, and manifestos, discovering a trove of work by writers and outsiders who had often been relegated to the shadows of famous men like Ernest Hemingway and George Orwell. She encounters the rookie journalist Martha Gellhorn coming into her own in Spain and the radical writer Josephine Herbst questioning her political allegiances. She finds the novelist Sylvia Townsend Warner embracing a freedom in Barcelona that was impossible for queer women back at home in England and, by contrast, Virginia Woolf struggling to keep the war out of her life, honing her intellectual position as she did so. She tracks down the stories of Gerda Taro, a Jewish photographer whose work had long been misattributed, and Salaria Kea, a nurse from Harlem who saw the war as a chance to combat the prejudice she experienced as a woman of color. Here were individuals seizing an opportunity to oppose the forces that frightened them.

From a variety of backgrounds and beliefs, these women saw history coming, and they went out to meet it. Yet the reality was far from simple. When does tolerance become apathy? Where is the line between solidarity and appropriation? Is writing about the revolution the same as actively participating in it? With profound, personal insight, Watling reveals that their answers are as relevant today as they were then.

©2023 Sarah Watling (P)2023 Random House Audio

Critic reviews

"A brilliant, impassioned, and much-needed tribute to the women who used their art to fight fascism during the Spanish Civil War. Watling's research is meticulous, and her prose sings on every page. Tomorrow Perhaps the Future is extraordinary and captivating.”—Heather Clark, author of Pulitzer Prize-finalist Red Comet: The Short Life and Blazing Art of Sylvia Plath

"Provocative, compelling narratives of women on the front lines of fighting fascism, making history nearly a century ago—yet relegated to its dustbin until now. Tomorrow Perhaps the Future is a powerful, moving cautionary tale for today, how individual acts of bravery may yield more bitter than sweet unless sustained by broad movements for democracy and systemic change."—Helen Zia, author of Last Boat Out of Shanghai: The Epic Story of the Chinese Who Fled Mao’s Revolution

"Sarah Watling has brought together a remarkable group of personalities and her writing brings the Spanish Civil War to freshly vivid life. Best of all, she allows us to understand the sense of crisis and confusion felt by these women, who saw the war as the turning point of their age and tried to respond to it in ways that were useful, possible, and necessary to them. By pointing out the correspondence between their turbulent times and our current world crises, she makes us feel their urgency as our own.”—Judith Mackrell, author of The Correspondents: Six Women Writers on the Front Lines of World War II

Highly recommend

This book is an insightful treatment of very complex, material and history. It’s well researched, straightforward in presentation, and worth listening to twice!

Really beautiful book, interesting premise

From this book, I learned so much about the context of war, and the complications of living in it and reporting on it as an outsider. While I’m always a bit skeptical of the author reading their own work, I enjoyed her voice and ruminations throughout.

Remarkable storytelling by the author

This is the capstone of books written about the Spanish Civil War, the journalists and other forgotten personages who sacrificed so much to fight for a cause. A must-read!
Mary F.