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The Polish Rider (novel)The Polish Rider (Spanish: El jinete polaco) is a Spanish novel by Antonio Mu�oz Molina, published in 1991. The plot revolves around a man just about to enter mid-age reconstructing his family past, all cast against the background of a small Andalusian town. In terms of structure the narrative is non-linear; the book is a patchy structure of numerous episodes from 1870 to 1991, referred from different perspectives and in non-chronological order. In terms of style the novel is viewed as multi-genre exercise, which combines elements of detective fiction, heroic sonnet, feuilleton, realist novel, Doppelg�nger, adventure story, generational saga, Bildungsroman and Gothic prose. In terms of major themes it is usually viewed as a discourse upon relationship between identity and memory, either in case of an individual or in case of the collective Spanish self. Upon release the novel was highly valued by both critics and readers; the novel earned Premio Planeta for 1991 and topped the Spanish weekly list of best selling novels from November 1991 till February 1992. In some rankings compiled today it appears among the best Spanish-language novels of the last few decades.

Plot
Don Mercurio, a fresh graduate in medicine, young free-thinker, freemason and republican conspirator against the monarchy, feels compelled to flee Madrid after assassination of general Prim in 1870. He settles in an Andalusian town of M�gina, where he gets engaged in love affair with Agueda, young and beautiful wife of a local conservative and clerical aristocrat, constable D�valos, owner of the Casa de las Torres palace. The romance is uncovered, Mercurio flees overseas, and his lover gives birth to their son. She is immured alive in 1871, while the anonymous baby is left at a religious institution. D�valos leaves the town for ever, leaving a guardian to take care of gradually dilapidating building.

The baby, given the name of Pedro Exp�sito, is adopted by a poor horticultural worker. The young Pedro takes part in the 1890s war in Cuba and returns to M�gina almost simultaneously with his father; in the early 20th century Don Mercurio tries to find out what happened to his son and he apparently succeeds, but Pedro refuses to learn who his parents were. Don Mercurio resumes his practice as a physician, unaware of the fate of his lover. Pedro gets married and has many children, one of them Leonor, in the 1920s the most handsome girl in M�gina. Sometime in the late 1920s she marries Manuel, a humble worker; the couple work hard in horticulture and have 7 children.

An unrelated major Galaz, posted to the M�gina garrison in April 1936, single-handedly prevents rebellion of local troops and shots a lieutenant suspected of leading the plot. He then fights in the Republican army, to leave Spain after the war. Manuel spends the war in ranks of Guardia de Asalto fighting the rebels in nearby mountains; at the day of Nationalist takeover of the town he reports on duty as usual - against the advice of his father-in-law Pedro - and gets immediately arrested; he spends 2 years in a Francoist labor camp.

In 1941 an accidental explosion in half-ruined and uninhabited Casa de las Torres reveals a hidden chamber with the perfectly mummified corps of Agueda D�valos. Don Mercurio arranges for the mummy to be secretly taken to his place, where because of its rapid disintegration he orders a wax copy; remnants of the mummy are secretly burnt. Don Mercurio dies in few years; his wagon-driver inherits the lab, which for decades remains unused. The love for mummified woman is cultivated by Ramiro the Portraitist, a photographer who unaware of its history cherishes the photograph of mummified corpse he made when discovered in 1941.

A daughter of Manuel and Leonor marries Francisco, a humble M�gina farmer, in the early 1950s. They live extremely laborious, hard and uneventful life, and have one child, Manuel, born in 1956. He grows fed up with provincial town, fascinated by English rock. In 1973, drunk and high on drugs, he probably has sex with Nadia, daughter to comandante Galaz, then librarian in a New York university, who following death of his second wife decides to visit M�gina. Galaz and Nadia leave M�gina shortly; she starts work in tourist business, he becomes a pensioner in a nursery house in New Jersey.

Manuel completes linguistics study in the late 1970s and becomes a simultaneous interpreter, working mostly for the European Parliament in Brussels. He is increasingly detached from his family and town, but does not take root elsewhere and becomes sort of a perfect alien to wherever he lives. Nadia gets married in the US, gives birth and gets divorced when in 1990 she bumps into Manuel at a conference in Madrid. She recognizes him; the two have sex. In two months Manuel arranges for a professional trip to the US, where he finds Nadia; the two meet again and have sex again, apparently in love. In 1991 he returns to M�gina in wake of death of his grandmother Leonor, while Nadia decides she would take a temporary employment in Madrid. Manuel discovers the true story of Aguado and Mercurio, revealed by old Don Mercurio's wagon-driver. Nadia comes to M�gina; Manuel meets her and the two go to a hotel.

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