Europe: tourism and migration

As is well known, one of the factors that define the global world in which we live is mobility. Thus, for example, when Thomas Eriksen, in 2007, theorised on the concept of globalisation, searching for its defining features, he included human mobility (whether for necessity - economic or social -, pleasure or business) among the eight defining factors of globalisation. This vision of the movement of people, by juxtaposing, in order to point out their obvious differences, tourism and migrations caused by necessity, makes it possible to situate the population movements that are taking place in our contemporary world in a common historical context.  

The contrast between migration and tourism is one of the themes running through Ilja Leonard Pfeijffer's novel Gran Hotel Europa (recently published in Spanish by Acantilado). As in previous articles, on this occasion we are also interested in the aesthetic and conceptual treatment given to the theme of migration in the realm of fiction.  

Although the protagonist of the novel, whose name is Ilja, like the author, is staying in a European hotel to write a text on mass tourism, the central theme of the novel is, in reality, Europe, its identity anchored in the past, and the fact that, precisely because it has such a rich past, the old continent has found in mass tourism the best alternative (or perhaps the only one, in the absence of political, economic or technological leadership) to have a significant presence in today's world. Thus, the novel is a love song to Europe for all that it was, in which the glorious past contrasts with the irrelevance of the present and the uncertainties of the future.  

The migratory movements that shape Europe's current political situation are the subject of the author's reflections on two levels: on the individual level, through the character of Abdul, a bellboy at the Grand Hotel, whose personal story represents that of so many African migrants forced to cross the Mediterranean, fleeing war and cruelty, in search of a better future on a continent that will allow them to develop a life project. In fiction, Abdul enriches the account of his journey to Europe with references taken from the Aeneid, in an intertextual play that corroborates the timelessness of migratory movements, while paying homage to the European literary tradition. 

On a collective level, the novel allows a parallel to be drawn between mass tourism, a "barbaric invasion of Europe that institutions see as a business model and actively encourage, when in fact it is a threat", and the migrations brought about by necessity, such as "the presumed invasion of Africans, which is presented to us as a threat, when in fact it could offer prospects for the future" (p. 269). The vision of migration issues, which the author shows us through one of the characters staying in the hotel (the erudite Patelski), is positive: "if we know how to see how useful it can be for our societies, migration ceases to be a problem and becomes a solution". 

Through different narrative devices, the author includes in the novel reflections on different aspects of European culture. Thus, George Steiner's ideas on the essence of Europe and the five features that for him define the continent's culture (the cafés, the landscape on a human scale, the overwhelming presence of its history, the conjunction of reason and faith, and the awareness of its own decadence) are taken up. In the chapter entitled "The Concert", the narrator reinforces the thesis of the importance of the past in Europe's identity with his considerations on the contemporary practice of classical music, "whose ultimate aim is to interpret as faithfully as possible masterpieces of the past (...)". Another of the story's plots is devoted to the painting of the great masters and the role of museums and galleries. Towards the end of the story, in the mouth of the character Ilja, there is a declaration of love for Europe and what the European Union represents as an institution, despite its defects and the difficulties of the project. 

We find ourselves, then, before a text that analyses the vicissitudes of contemporary Europe in the mould of a fiction in which humour is not absent. Through his literary artefact, the author records the difficulties that Europe as a continent faces today, as well as the perspective of the past with which Europeans face today's world.