Refashioning the Sociopolitical in Spanish Modernist Literature (1902-1914)

Refashioning the Sociopolitical in Spanish Modernist Literature (1902-1914) By Ricardo Lopez A dissertation submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Romance Languages and Literatures and the Designated Emphasis in Critical Theory in the Graduate Division of the University of California, Berkeley Committee in charge: Professor Dru Dougherty, Chair Professor Ivonne del Valle Professor Robert Kaufman Fall 2015 Abstract Refashioning the Sociopolitical in Spanish Modernist Literature (1902-1914) by Ricardo Lopez Doctor of Philosophy in Romance Languages and Literatures with a Designated Emphasis in Critical Theory University of California, Berkeley Professor Dru Dougherty, Chair In this dissertation I argue that the modernist breakthroughs achieved by José Martínez Ruiz’s La voluntad (1902), Ramón del Valle-Inclán’s Sonata de otoño (1902), and Miguel de Unamuno’s Niebla (1914) emerged as a response to the shortsightedness of the revolutionary politics that had taken root in Restoration Spain. I examine how these writers take the historical materials of their sociopolitical world—its tropes and uses of language—and reconstellate them as artworks in which the familiar becomes estranged and reveals truths that have been obscured by the ideological myopia of Spain’s radicalized intellectuals. Accordingly, I demonstrate that the tropes, language, and images that constitute La voluntad, Niebla, and Sonata de otoño have within them a historical sediment that turns these seemingly apolitical works into an “afterimage” of Spain’s sociopolitical reality. Thus I show how sociopolitical critiques materialize out of the dialectic between historical materials and their artistic handling. Although La voluntad, Sonata de otoño, and Niebla seem to eschew political themes, I contend that they are the product of their authors’ keen understanding of the politics of their moment. As such, these novels bear a critical relation to the sociohistorical that is based not on protest or denunciation but on the careful judgment and observation of the hidden patterns of Spanish society and turn-of-the-century revolutionary culture. Consequently, the stylistic affectations and rarefied conceits of these works are not so much rejections of the sociohistorical as aesthetic refashionings of it. Chapter 1 discusses the intellectual and socipolitical dynamics that led Martínez Ruiz, Valle-Inclán, and Unamuno to reconsider their understanding of literature’s place in society. In particular, the chapter examines how the positivist ideology that came to dominate liberal thought resulted in a leftist rhetoric that replicated the capitalist ethos it claimed to denounce and protest. This ideological incongruence came to the fore in the critical reception and public commotion of two plays, Juan José (1895) by Joaquín 1 Dicenta, and Electra (1901) by Benito Pérez Galdós, which prompted the three modernist writers to reconfigure their understanding of art and artistic autonomy. Chapter 2 argues that Martínez Ruiz’s La voluntad is a product of the lessons learned from the liberal euphoria that was unleashed by Galdós’s Electra. It traces how La voluntad, through its formal innovations and the texture of its language, steers away from the habit that many left-wing radicals had of reducing literature to a pseudo-sociology that conformed to their sociological principles and liberal platitudes. In doing so, the novel makes possible forms of thinking that had been increasingly obscured by the abstract rationalism of Spain’s liberal culture. Prior to this reading the chapter examines critically a reception history that has erroneously considered La voluntad as a sign of Martínez Ruiz’s turn away from the sociohistorical. Chapter 3 argues that Valle-Inclán’s Sonata de otoño is not a withdrawal from or rejection of the sociohistorical but is rather an artwork that grounds itself deeply in the political dynamics of its historical moment. By examining the Sonata’s patterning of motifs and language, the chapter demonstrates how Valle-Inclán refashions the narcissistic and terroristic tendencies of revolutionary politics. Moreover, by refashioning these historical materials into a highly stylized and polished literary work, the Sonata vindicates moral virtues that had been discredited by the impatience and zeal of Spain’s radicalized liberals. Chapter 4 contends that Unamuno’s Niebla, despite its rarefied and humorous content, bears a critical potency with deep historical and political implications. By examining how Niebla plays with language and a series of motifs, the chapter reveals the novel’s critique of the sorry state of Spain’s revolutionary culture. More specifically, what Niebla throws into relief is the obsession that Spanish socialists have with modeling their politics after the revolutionary history and culture of France. The chapter then argues that Niebla vindicates the Spanish tradition of aristocratic idleness and offers it as a counterargument to the socialist acquiescence to all things French. By insisting on idleness as a space for critical agency, Niebla suggests that a tradition rejected offhand by socialists turns out to be a salutary exercise for a liberal polity. 2 Table of Contents Acknowledgments ii Introduction 1 Chapter 1 Revolutionary Politics and Liberal Culture in Fin-de-Siglo Spain 7 Chapter 2 José Martínez Ruiz’s La voluntad and the Pursuit of Aesthetic Autonomy 26 Chapter 3 Refashioning the Sociopolitical in Ramón del Valle-Inclán’s Sonata de otoño 53 Chapter 4 Miguel de Unamuno’s Niebla and the Critique of Spain’s Revolutionary Culture 79 Conclusion 108 Bibliography 114 Appendices 126 i Acknowledgments This dissertation owes a great deal to the many people who have offered me encouragement and support. Professor Dru Dougherty, my dissertation advisor, has been a key figure throughout my doctoral studies. From the beginning, he has been a reliable source of scholarly insight and moral support. I thank him for his mentorship and for being the model professor and scholar I strive to be. I also thank him for his guidance throughout the process of writing this dissertation. His comments have helped strengthen my project and have saved me from several infelicities of content and style. I am also thankful to Professors Ivonne del Valle and Robert Kaufman. I owe to them much of my growth as a scholar and many of the merits of my dissertation. I value enormously the support they have given me over the years—in the seminars I took with them, in the preparation for my qualifying exams, and in the writing of my dissertation. It is also with great pleasure that I thank Verónica López for her constant encouragement and administrative support. Also, the professors with whom I’ve studied in the Romance Languages and Literatures Program, the Critical Theory Program, and the Spanish and Portuguese Department have all contributed to my intellectual development. I thank them for the seminars, readings, and discussions that helped enrich my ideas and research skills. Special thanks are also in order for the friends who filled these PhD years with many laughs and much fun: Krista Brune, Manuel Cuellar, Camilo Jaramillo, Ivett López Malagamba, Roberto Medina, Iulia Sprinceana, Dexter Zavalza Hough-Snee. Without the support of my family I would not be writing these lines. The discipline and insight that have gone into this dissertation are rooted in the values I learned from the two most intelligent people I know: my parents. Completing a PhD is certainly a big accomplishment, but next to their hard-won achievements, it really is quite modest. And for this I am eternally grateful to them for always giving me something larger to strive for. Last but not least, I thank my wife, Nanci Buiza, whose courage and work ethic have been a source of inspiration, and whose love and encouragement have filled me with the energy and drive to bring this project to completion. ii Introduction This dissertation contends that the modernist breakthroughs achieved by José Martínez Ruiz’s La voluntad (1902), Ramón del Valle-Inclán’s Sonata de otoño (1902), and Miguel de Unamuno’s Niebla (1914) emerged as a response to the shortsightedness of the revolutionary politics that had taken root in Restoration Spain. In the chapters that follow, I examine how these writers take the historical materials of their sociopolitical world—its tropes and uses of language—and reconstellate them as artworks in which the familiar becomes estranged and reveals truths that have been obscured by the ideological myopia of Spain’s radicalized left-wing intellectuals. Accordingly, the tropes, language, and images that constitute La voluntad, Niebla, and Sonata de otoño have within them a historical sediment that turns these seemingly apolitical works into an “afterimage” of Spain’s sociopolitical reality. My aim, then, is to study the sociopolitical implications and critiques that materialize out of the dialectic between historical materials and their artistic handling. In essence, I argue that although La voluntad, Sonata de otoño, and Niebla seem to eschew political themes, they are the product of their authors’ keen understanding of the politics of their moment. As such, these novels bear a critical relation to the sociohistorical that is based not on protest or denunciation but on the careful judgment and observation of the hidden patterns of Spanish society and turn-of-the-century revolutionary culture. Consequently, the stylistic affectations and rarefied conceits of these works are not so much rejections of the sociohistorical as aesthetic refashionings of it. I read these key works of Spanish modernism as reconstellations rather than as copies or rejections of social reality. That these novels do not obey the demand for a faithful representation of reality does not mean, however, that they are whimsical or arbitrary. On the contrary, I argue that these works were constructed with a keen sense of judgment and awareness of the realities of Restoration Spain—its social customs, habits of mind, linguistic practices, and political ideologies.

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