The Washington PostDemocracy Dies in Darkness

Barbara Probst Solomon, writer who chronicled Franco’s rule in Spain, dies at 90

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September 2, 2019 at 7:41 p.m. EDT
Barbara Probst Solomon, second from left, at a 2004 exhibition she curated at the Instituto Cervantes in New York. She is joined by Antonio Muñoz Molina, left, the institute’s director, and Spain’s Prince Felipe and his wife, Letizia Ortiz. (Richard Drew/AP)

Barbara Probst Solomon, a novelist, essayist and cultural critic who chronicled her youthful opposition to Gen. Francisco Franco’s dictatorship in Spain, including her involvement in an audacious mission to free political prisoners, died Sept. 1 at her home in Manhattan. She was 90.

The cause was renal disease, said her daughters, Maria Solomon and Carla Solomon Magliocco.