Fernando González Ochoa | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Born | April 24, 1895 (1895-04-24) |
| Died | February 16, 1964(1964-02-16) (aged 68) Envigado, Colombia |
| Philosophical work | |
| Era | 20th-century philosophy |
| Region | Western philosophy |
| School | Existentialism |
| Main interests | Sociology,epistemology,history,politics,theology,economy,moral |
Fernando González Ochoa (April 24, 1895 – February 16, 1964), was a Colombian writer andexistentialistphilosopher known as "el filósofo de Otraparte" (The Philosopher from Elsewhere). He wrote aboutsociology, history, art,morality,economics,epistemology andtheology in a humorous, and creative style, in various genres of literature. González is considered one of the most original writers of Colombia during the 20th century. His ideas were controversial and had a great influence in the Colombian society at his time and still today. González work inspiredNadaism, a literary and cultural movement founded byGonzalo Arango and some other writers, poets and painters that surrounded him. HisOtraparte house inEnvigado, is today a museum and the headquarters of the cultural foundation to preserve and promote his legacy. His house was declared a National Patrimony of Colombia in 2006.
González lived during the beginning of the 20th century (1895–1964), a time of change, political turbulence and revolutions in industry. He was born seven years after the new political agreement of a more conservative constitution (1888) that gave great influence to theCatholic Church in Colombian society, especially in the education of future generations. Four years after, when he was 4 years old, the nation fell in a bloodycivil war, the 1899 - 1902Thousand Days War. The other important event that happened during his life was in 1903 when Colombia lostPanama. In 1926 theBanana massacre gave evidence of the labor problems of the different growing Colombian industries. He lived also in one of the principal trade centers of the country, theMetropolitan Area of Medellín, the first to start anIndustrial Revolution in Colombia during the 1930s. González was also a witness of the emergence ofFascism in Italy when he was consul of Colombia in that country. In 1948 the killing of the presidential candidateJorge Eliécer Gaitán opened the doors of a new political instability withEl Bogotazo. All these events are reflected in the works and thoughts of Fernando González Ochoa.
Fernando González Ochoa was born inEnvigado, a city in theAburrá Valley (Antioquia State). He was the second of seven children. His parents were Daniel González and Pastora Ochoa. His father was a school teacher, the inspiration of one of his books (El Maestro de Escuela). He was expelled from the school of thePresentation of Envigado because he insulted a sister after being punished.[1]
Something similar would happen soon after he joined theJesuit College ofMedellín, but this time because he was caught reading Shopenhauer andNietzsche. The young González faced his teacher of philosophy, Rev. Quiroz, saying that nothing can be and can not be at the same time. He was a sophomore in high school when the Jesuits asked him to leave the school.
In 1915 he became a member ofLos Panidas, a group of sceptics, withLeón de Greiff,Ricardo Rendón, Félix Mejía Arango, Libardo Parra Toro, José Manuel Mora Vásquez and Eduardo Vasco, among other young writers, artists and intellectuals. In 1916 González published his first book,Pensamientos de un viejo (Thoughts of an Oldman). The presentation was written byFidel Cano, the founder ofEl Espectador newspaper. In 1919 González got his diploma in law atUniversity of Antioquia, however his thesis, "El derecho a no obedecer" (The Right Not To Obey) was not welcome by the Academic Council of the university. González had to make some modifications to the text and published it under the title of "Una tesis" (A Thesis).
In 1921 he became Judge of the Superior Tribunal ofManizales. In 1922 he married in Medellín Margarita Restrepo Gaviria, the daughter of former presidentCarlos E. Restrepo. In 1928 he is nominated Second Judge of the Medellín Tribunals where he knew Benjamín Correa who would become one of his best friends. With Correa he visited several towns in the states of Antioquia,Caldas andValle del Cauca. From those visits he got the inspiration to one of his most popular books,Viaje a pie (Journey on Foot), published in 1929, but banned by theArchbishop of Medellín under the penalty of mortal sin.
González went toVenezuela in 1931 to meet dictatorJuan Vicente Gómez. He considered Gómez a sprout of LibertadorSimón Bolívar and they became friends. The dictator was the godfather of one of the sons of González and he dedicated a work to him, "Mi compadre".
González was nominated by PresidentEnrique Olaya Herrera as consul of Colombia inGenoa, Italy in 1932. He went with his family toEurope and that same yearLe Livre libre, a publishing house ofParis, published his bookDon Mirocletes. About that workManuel Ugarte wrote a letter to him fromNice saying:
"When your book arrived I had at the moment the visit ofGabriela Mistral and we read with delight some chapters. There is so much force of evocation, so profound irony in the irreverent commentary and so much grace in elegant style!"[2]
From Spain he received two letters ofJosé Vasconcelos on December 14 and 30, 1932. Vasconcelos wrote:
"You are thinking with freedom and that is what we need in America, which always they think in response to an attitude (...) The conferences are a delight, a bitter delight, with depth (...) Your page on the stamp ofPonce de León is wonderful, I was excited, I almost cried."[2]
He received other letter of the Colombian writerJosé María Vargas Vila, who was exiled inMadrid. Vargas wrote to him:
"You have the vice to think and the virtue to say beautifully what you think; an Artist-Thinker, that is a rare product in our latitudes; you completely fulfil that model; I can not hide that what I love most in your books is the air of controversy that you can breathe in them; that little breath of combat is invigorating and toning; to live is to fight."[3]
In 1933 the Italian police found his notes with criticisms of the regime ofBenito Mussolini andFascism. He was transferred toMarsella due to a petition of the Italian government. Those notes were the origin of his workEl hermafrodita dormido (The Sleeping Hermaphrodite), a book with his experiences in the classic art museums of Italy. The book was published in Spain in 1934.
In 1934 González returned to Colombia establishing in his town, Envigado, a small farm on which to live that he named "Bucarest Villa". There he started to publish theAntioquia Magazine until 1945.[4] In 1935 theArturo Zapata Printing Press ofManizales published his "El Remordimiento" (The Remorse), an essay in theology written in Marsella (France) andLetters toEstanislao Zuleta.
The former president ofEcuador,José María Velasco Ibarra, who was exiled in Colombia, visited González in Bucarest Villa in 1936 and they became very good friends. To Velasco he dedicated some chapters ofLos negroides (The Negroid People) where González called Velasco the first "Politician-Thinker" of the Americas. By his part, Velasco called González in his workConciencia o barbarie: exégesis de la Conciencia política americana (Conscience or Barbarism: Exegesis of the American Political Conscience), published first by theAtlantida Printing Press of Medellín, "the most original and deep of the South American sociologists".[5]
In that year died inMadrid theVenezuelan novelistTeresa de la Parra with whom González had been friends since 1930 when she visited him in Envigado. It was also the year ofLos negroides publication, an essay on New Granada (Colombia,Venezuela andEcuador), saying that it is the only American region where the merger of races will create an original culture for a unified man. Such merger is a principle of promises and appalling realities at the same time.[5]
He started in 1940 the construction of his house in Envigado that at that time he calledLa huerta del alemán (The Garden of the German), but theWorld War II would make him to change the name forOtraparte (Other Place). The villa was designed with architectCarlos Obregón, engineerFélix Mejía Arango and painterPedro Nel Gómez. That year he published "Santander", an essay about GeneralFrancisco de Paula Santander. The writerTomás Carrasquilla, his friend and the Colombian novelist he most admired, died.
InOtraparte he received the American playwrightThornton Wilder to whom he dedicated his workEl maestro de escuela (The School Teacher). Wilder was in Colombia as a cultural ambassador of his country in South America and wrote about theGarden of the German: "It is more delightful than all Chapinero".
On April 9, 1948, Colombia shuddered with the killing of presidential candidateJorge Eliécer Gaitán inBogotá. González dedicated to him some thoughts in 1936 inLos negroides:
"Today I met Jorge Eliecer Gaitán. He is a lively littlemestizo, reader. He speaks and you put attention. How is he a man of action? I have known in my life three Don Juans: they never spoke about love. I have known two actives: they were silent. (...) How come to be that he made a political Party? In order to be listened. He is the will to talk made man; the instinct to talk made his face and all his body. He is the body of the man who talks."[6]
In June 1949, afterEl Bogotazo, González wrote in the edition of hisAntioquia Magazine:
"The Colombian people is above its class director; this one does not exist, but it is the cross-eyed abortion of what they call here university. Was it what inspired Gaitán to elaborate that sentence that he used to delight the multitudes: The people is superior to its leaders?"[6]
In 1953 he was nominated consul of Colombia in Europe, but he stayed most of the time inBilbao where he studiedSimon Bolívar andIgnatius of Loyola. His friend Thornton Wilder andJean-Paul Sartre asked to include his name in the list of candidates to theNobel Prize in Literature of 1955 and two times he was nominated.[7] The writersGabriela Mistral,Jacinto Benavente andMiguel de Unamuno admired his work.
In September 1957 González returned to Colombia, to hisOtraparte villa, remaining until his death in 1964. In 2006 PresidentÁlvaro Uribe approved Law 1068 to exalt the memory, life and work of the philosopher Fernando González and declaredOtraparte Home Museum, in Envigado, as a national patrimony.
Fernando González is called the "Philosopher of Authenticity"[8] and his thought is related to the experience of his life as a man. He used to say that we must live in the simple but bringing awareness of the essentials.[9]
He thought about the Colombian man and, thus, theLatin American, their personality, fights and expressions. He called himself the "Philosopher of the Personality ofSouth America". He wrote that the Latin American man might develop the individuality to arise from their anonymity. He criticized what he called theLatin American vanity that was without substance and invited to express the personality with energy, giving to life the highest value.[9]
González thought his time as the decadence of the principle of freedom and individualism for an action of flocks following calves to worship (Adolf Hitler,Benito Mussolini). He longed for the man of the ancient Egypt, Greece and theRenaissance.
