Essays

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Xavier I & the Kingdom of Redonda

by Larry Lynch

Sun., 5 May 2001, 7:30 p.m.

Life just gets stranger and better all the time. I was innocently reading a New York Times article* about the Spanish novelist Javier Marías, when I got to the part about how Marías claims to be King Xavier I of the Caribbean island Kingdom of Redonda. The article provided a weblink to the official Redonda website, which included a history of the kingdom a truly bizarre and wonderful tale. If you get as obsessed as I did, then you can visit an equally bizarre website on the subject by some dude named Robert who, with his wife Elizabeth, intends to invade Redonda (which apparently really exists) and declare themselves King Robert the Bald and Queen Elizabeth, thus usurping the kingship from the true claimant to the throne, King Leo I (aka William Leonard Gates). Meanwhile, the official website has numerous debunkings of the dubious claims of King Xavier and other "imposters." Note however that King Robert has got the history totally screwed up, but he has beautiful color pictures of Redonda and of the only boat in the Royal Navy.

Meanwhile, something called Charter-Yachts.com has links to the rest of King Robert's website, which includes a map of Redonda (with some highly suspect place names), the sheet music for the Redondan national anthem (really!), official merchandise, and information on how you can join the Royal Navy and register your yacht therein.

Oh, yes, you can hear a recorded statement from King Leo on the official Redonda website, plus a recording of the national anthem (click the link at upper left).

The author of the Times article wondered if Marías had invented the whole thing, but I did find verification using Google that the 2nd King (Felipe I, aka M. P. Shiell, son of the first king and himself king from 1880-1947,) really existed and really was a well-known sci-fi writer and that the 3rd king (Juan I, aka John Gawsworth aka Terence Ian Fytton Armstrong) really was M. P. Shiell'a editor and literary executor and apparently King of Redonda.

Are you confused yet? Good! That's the way we should all go through life.

Hope you are having as productive a weekend as I am :}

*To read New York Times articles, you have to register (it's free). Also, articles are suppposedly only available to the public for a week or so. After that, you have to purchase a copy for a few dollars. However, it appears that if you create a link to articles while they are still fresh, the link continues to work as proven by the Redonda link above.