Guerra, as a last name, there are as many as there have been war conflicts in the world. From Juan Luis – Guerra –, and his ¡let it rain coffee in the field!, to our admired Alfonso, who had time to change Spain with Felipe. There are also some in Teguise, where together with the colleague Jaime Salvador, councilor in the City Council, we have one of the most interesting characters that our Municipality has given: Ángel Guerra.
Writer, journalist and politician, in 1874 he was baptized with the name of José Betancort Cabrera, although he resorted to the pseudonym of Ángel Guerra when it came to writing. Even in that he demonstrated his talent, adopting the name that gave title to a novel by the author of the National Episodes or Fortunata y Jacinta, a “such” Benito Pérez Galdós, of whom he was also a friend. Well, if there have always been prominent pseudonyms, let them ask the aforementioned “Isidoro” Felipe González Marques, even more so in literature, where Sthepen King was called Richard Bachman for years, or Ricardo Eliécer Neftalí, whom we know for his “I like you when you are silent because you are like absent” that he signed as Pablo Neruda.
Common notes, talent and pseudonyms, which concur in the person of José Betancort “Ángel Guerra”, to whom they even dedicate one of the main streets of La Villa, labeled with his real name, and waiting for a legend or QR code that informs every curious person of his merits, successes and achievements. Well, many are unaware of his political career, as the first national deputy in the Cortes for Lanzarote, or the mastery of letters with stories such as Cariño Eterno, Al jallo, Las paces, etc., unless your name is Zebensuí Rodríguez Álvarez and you dedicate “La Lapa y otros relatos seleccionados”, from the clásicos remotos publishing house.
He knows him so well that, in the presentation of this work at the Spínola Palace in La Villa, he added to the usual brilliance of his oratory the shared demand that the Day of Canarian Literature for 2021 – always February 21 in honor of the death of José Viera y Clavijo – have the name, for once, of a writer from Lanzarote. Well, the Ángel Guerra, Leandro Perdomo, Benito Pérez Ármas… have been waiting since 2006 to be able to share the spotlight with José de Viera y Clavijo (2006), Bartolomé Cairasco de Figueroa and Antonio de Viana (2007), Benito Pérez Galdós (2008), Mercedes Pinto (2009), María Rosa Alonso (2010), Tomás Morales (2011), Pedro García Cabrera (2012), José de Viera y Clavijo (2013), Agustín Millares Sall (2014), Arturo Maccanti (2015), Pedro Lezcano (2016), Rafael Arozarena (2017), Pino Ojeda (2018), Agustín Espinosa (2019) and Josefina de la Torre (2020).
It is time that next February 21 the letters of Guerra and his invaluable contribution to Canarian literature are remembered, even more so on the seventieth anniversary of the departure of José Betancort: “He burned with rage when he saw that the fishermen of Arrieta, also camped on the northern coast of La Graciosa, ran greedily, with a stroke of the oar or at full speed, to the wide cove, sheltered from the tragic cliff of the cliffs of Famara” (Días de Soledad, included in the story Al jallo). May it be so.
Marcos Bergaz, spokesperson for the PSOE in the Teguise City Council.