SOME CONSIDERATIONS ON MODERN SPANISH 



FICTION 



By S. Griswold Morley 



It is a fact that the novels produced in Spain within the last 

 forty years are not well known in America, or even in the rest of 

 Europe, except to specialists, despite the respectable quantity and 

 undeniable quality of the work. French novels seem to have a 

 faculty of penetration frequently out of all proportion to their 

 intrinsic value. It is due in part to the towering position held by 

 France in the intellectual world, and partly to the tendency of French 

 writers to develop in the field of fiction whatever current of thought 

 chances to sweep across Europe at a given moment. Spain, hiding 

 behind the Pyrenees, is wont to meditate her own concerns at leisure, 

 and evolve her own conceptions of art and life. The provinciality 

 which forms at once the barrier and the charm of Spanish letters 

 shuts many from almost unHmited enjoyment. Just as the drama 

 of the seventeenth century in Spain can furnish one interesting read- 

 ing matter for half a lifetime, so the recent Spanish novel, voluminous 

 and entertaining, can in case of need fill up the other half. Perez 

 Galdos alone, with forty Episodios nacionales and more than forty 

 other novels, could occupy one's mind for a long time, and not much 

 of the pabulum would be mediocre, if not much would be absolutely 

 of the first rank. Spain has only resumed an activity in fiction 

 which was broken off at about 1650. 



The novel and the drama are the two branches of literature in 

 which Spain has always excelled. She has never produced a pre- 

 eminent philosopher,- essayist or mathematician. In lyric poetry 

 she holds a better place, yet the average student of general literature 

 cannot recall the name of a single Castilian poet. Spain has no 

 Dante nor Milton nor Goethe nor Hugo. Her inferiority is implied 

 when one speaks of the charming poet Becquer as a Spanish Heine, 

 or of Espronceda as a Spanish Byron. Great original geniuses do 

 not suggest the name of some other genius. Cervantes and Cal- 



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