Gender and Nation in the Spanish Modernist Novel , livre ebook

365

pages

English

Ebooks

2003

Écrit par
Roberta Johnson

Publié par
Vanderbilt University Press

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365

pages

English

Ebooks

2003

Lire un extrait

Obtenez un accès à la bibliothèque pour le consulter en ligne En savoir plus

Publié par

Vanderbilt University Press

Date de parution

12 décembre 2003

Nombre de lectures

EAN13

9780826591746

Langue

English

Poids de l'ouvrage

1 Mo

Offering a fresh, revisionist analysis of Spanish fiction from 1900 to 1940, this study examines the work of both men and women writers and how they practiced differing forms of modernism. As Roberta Johnson notes, Spanish male novelists emphasized technical and verbal innovation in representing the contents of an individual consciousness and thus were more modernist in the usual understanding of the term. Female writers, on the other hand, were less aesthetically innovative but engaged in a social modernism that focused on domestic issues, gender roles, and relations between the sexes. Compared to the more conventional--even reactionary--ways their male counterparts treated such matters, Spanish women's fiction in the first half of the twentieth century was often revolutionary.

The book begins by tracing the history of public discourse on gender from the 1890s through the 1930s, a discourse that included the rise of feminism. Each chapter then analyzes works by female and male novelists that address key issues related to gender and nationalism: the concept of intrahistoria, or an essential Spanish soul; modernist uses of figures from the Spanish literary tradition, notably Don Quixote and Don Juan; biological theories of gender prevalent in the 1920s and 1930s; and the growth of an organized feminist movement that coincided with the burgeoning Republican movement.

This is the first book dealing with this period of Spanish literature to consider women novelists, such as Maria Martinez Sierra, Carmen de Burgos, and Concha Espina, alongside canonical male novelists, including Miguel de Unamuno, Ramon del Valle-Inclan, and Pio Baroja. With its contrasting conceptions of modernism, Johnson's work provides a compelling new model for bridging the gender divide in the study of Spanish fiction.

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Publié par

Vanderbilt University Press

Date de parution

12 décembre 2003

Nombre de lectures

EAN13

9780826591746

Langue

English

Poids de l'ouvrage

1 Mo

Gender andNation inthe Spanish Modernist Novel

Roberta Johnson

Gender฀and฀Nation฀ in฀the฀Spanish฀Modernist฀Novel

Roberta Johnson

Vanderbilt University Press 

is book is printed on acid-free paper. Manufactured in the United States of America

Publication of this volume has been supported by a generous subsidy from the Program for Cultural Cooperation between Spain’s Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports, and United States Universities.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Johnson, Roberta Gender and nation in the Spanish modernist novel / Roberta Johnson.— st ed. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index.  --- (cloth : alk. paper)  --- (pbk. : alk. paper) . Spanish îction—th century—History and criticism. . Sex role in literature. . National characteristics, Spanish, in literature. . Modernism (Literature)—Spain. I. Title. .  .’—dc 













Contents

Preface

vii

Introduction: e Feminist Novel in Spain at the Crossroads of Modernism 

Women and the Soul of Spain



Don Quixote as National Icon and Modernist Ideal

e Domestication of a Modernist Don Juan



Baroja’s, Unamuno’s, and Azorín’s Failed Feminists

Biology as Destiny: New National Discourses on Gender Inform the Novel of the s and Beyond

Vanguard Feminists Dream the Nation

Conclusion: A Legacy and a Prophecy

Notes



References

Index















Preface

When I înished writingCrossîre: Philosophy and the Novel in Spain –,my sense of accomplishment was somewhat diminished by an acute awareness that the book paid little attention to women writers. e focus of the book—philosophical îction—precluded a full treat-ment of the cultural landscape of the period, especially since women did not for the most part write what I deîned as philosophical îction. In contrast with Virginia Woolf ’s hypothetical Judith Shakespeare of the English Renaissance, published women writers—notably Carmen de Burgos, Concha Espina, Blanca de los Ríos, Sofía Casanova, María Martínez Sierra (“Gregorio Martínez Sierra”), Margarita Nelken, Federica Montseny, Rosa Chacel, and María Zambrano—were present in early twentieth-century Spain. In large part because their literary forms and themes were dierent from those of the men who played an important role in shaping the criteria of canonical inclusion, however, these women simply did not make it into the literary histories. is book begins to îll the lacunae left byCrossîreand other books on early twentieth-century Spanish literary production that have ne-glected women writers. I have limited this study to îction because, although male and female authors approached îction in signiîcantly dierent ways, both men and women cultivated the genre extensively between  and  and beyond. Male Spanish authors of the early twentieth century (often referred to as the Generation of ’, the Gen-eration of ’, and the Generation of ’) were more modernist in the traditional understanding of the term, emphasizing technical and ver-bal innovation in their eorts to represent the contents of an individual consciousness. Women engaged in what I call social modernism, a mode that focuses on interpersonal relations within formal and informal so-

vii

viii Gender and Nation in the Spanish Modernist Novel

cial parameters. Women’s îction, although less aesthetically innovative than male îction, was known to for its presentation of themes such as women’s social roles and unconventional sexual arrangements that were revolutionary by comparison to male novelists’ treatment of the subjects. Unlike elitist male îction, women’s îction was often published in popu-lar venues. is book opens up the Spanish modernist canon to include the so-cial modernism of women writers, a modernism that focused on domestic issues, gender roles, and relations between the sexes. e lines of division between aesthetic and social modernism are not îxed. Semicanonical male authors such as Felipe Trigo wrote popular novels that argue for free sexual expression. Trigo also tendered certain feminist ideals, such as women’s right to work and the need for paid leave for pregnancy and childcare. But because some of Trigo’s themes would take my discussions in diuse directions, I do not include his works in this book. In part because of the dierence in their emphasis, I originally con-sidered devoting this book exclusively to women novelists, but that approach would have simply reversed the lack of balance. Moreover, a single-sex book would not have allowed me to argue, as I do here, that larger sociopolitical discourses (most speciîcally those on gender) had an important impact on both male and female authors of Spanish îction in the modernist period. e work of women writers was shaped to a degree by the dominant male culture, and male literary production responded to some extent to the increased visibility that women came to achieve in the public arena at the turn of the century. As I directed attention to aspects of the novels other than philosophical content (as in Miguel de Unamuno’sNiebla,for example), there emerged a commentary on contemporary gender roles, often of a prescriptive nature. One of the greatest challenges in composingGender and Nation in the Spanish Modernist Novelwas to înd signiîcant common threads in the writings of men and women. Although, to some extent, male and female authors operated in dierent spheres and wrote for dierent audiences, I sought to highlight diverging approaches to the common interests of both spheres. One salient concern of male and female novelists was the past, present, and future of Spain as a nation, especially its traditions and the role of domestic arrangements within those traditions—that is, the

Preface ix

way in which gender informed their view of Spanish society. Novelistic reaction to the proliferating discourse on women and then to the grow-ing feminist movement in Spain is a constant throughout the modernist period (roughly –). us, the intertwining of thought about the way that Spain was or ought to be and the proper place of the genders within a particular model of Spanish society guides the overall design of this work. As the reader progresses through the book, it will help to keep in mind some working deînitions of “gender” and “nation,” slippery con-cepts that have occasioned much theoretical writing since the s. ese multilayered terms appear to shift meaning in dierent contexts. Except when I refer to novelists as being male or female, where the mean-ing is essentially a biological category or sex, “gender” usually refers to a socially constructed condition in which male- or femaleness is deîned by social norms and legal prescriptions. Many of my observations about male and female writers and their novels imply that social conditions inuenced the way that men and women wrote and help explain the dierences in male and female modernist narrative practices. e term “nation” refers to two basic categories: () At the end of the nineteenth century, the idea of the nature of Spain occasioned theorization that led to a variety of national myths, such as (a) the intrahistorical essential nature of the Spanish soul embodied in Castile and Spain’s glorious national imperial past and (b) new interpretations of literary îgures (especially Don Quixote and Don Juan) that either exalt or vilify the Spanish nation. () “Spain” refers to a concrete contemporary political entity analyzed and criticized by writers who sought to inuence and change it. Gender formed an important part of both the theories of a Spanish national essence and the eorts to shape the body politic. is book is organized roughly along chronological lines, beginning with narratives from the pre–World War I era (Miguel de Unamuno’s Paz en la guerra,María Martínez Sierra’sTú eres la paz,Azorín’sEl alma castellanaandCastilla) that wrestle with the concept of Spain’s eternal nature (Chapter ). Chapters  and  analyze primarily pre–World War I îction that incorporates themes from literary classics that allow male and female authors to îeld topics related to gender within the national tradi-tion. Miguel de Unamuno’sNiebla,Concha Espina’sLa esînge maragata,

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