Miguel de Unamuno

Miguel de Unamuno y Jugo (September 29, 1864 – December 31, 1936) was a Spanish writer and philosopher.

Introduction

Unamuno worked in all major genres: essays, novels, poetry, and theater, and, as a modernist, contributed greatly to dissolving the boundaries between genres and creating new ones. There is some debate as to whether Unamuno was in fact a member of the Generation of '98 (an ex post facto literary group of Spanish intellectuals and philosophers which was the creation of José Martínez Ruiz--a group that includes Antonio Machado, Azorín, Pío Baroja, Ramón del Valle-Inclán, Maetzu and Ganivet, among others). His philosophy also foreshadowed the thinking of 20th century existentialists, such as Jean-Paul Sartre and Albert Camus.

In addition to his writing, Unamuno played an important role in intellectual life of Spain. He served as rector of the University of Salamanca for two periods: from 1900 to 1914 and 1930 to 1936, during a period of great change and upheaval. Unamuno was removed from his post by the government in 1914, to the protest of Spanish intellectuals. From 1926 to 1930 he lived in exile, first in the Canary Islands and then in France, and did not return until the fall of General Primo de Rivera's dictatorship in 1930, when he took up his rectorship again. It is said in Salamanca that the day he returned to the University, Unamuno began his lecture by saying "Yesterday,..." as though he had not been gone at all. He was effectively removed from his post again by Franco during the Spanish Civil War. In 1936 at Salamanca University he had a brief quarrel with Millán Astray. Some time after that, he was placed under house arrest, where he remained until his death.

An important concept for Unamuno was intrahistoria. He thought that history could best be understood by looking at the small histories of anonymous people, rather than by focusing on major events such as wars and political pacts. In his own work, Unamuno tried to portray the lives of unknown, unimportant people.

Novels

Unamuno wrote the following novels, in chronological order:

• Paz en la guerra (Peace in War) (1895), a work that explores the relationship of self and world through the familiarity with death.

• Amor y pedagogía (Love and Pedagogy) (1902), which unites comedy and tragedy in an absurd parody of positivist sociology.

• El espejo de la muerte (The Mirror of Death) (1913), a collection of stories.

• Niebla (Fog) (1914), one of Unamuno's key works, which he called a nivola to distinguish it from the supposedly fixed form of the novel ("novela" in Spanish).

• Abel Sánchez (1917), a novel that uses the Cain and Abel story to explore envy.

• Tulio Montalbán (1920), a short novel on the threat of a man's public image undoing his true personality, a problem familiar to the famous Unamuno.

• Tres novelas ejemplares y un prólogo (Three Exemplary Novels and a Prologue) (1920), a much-studied work with a famous prologue.

• La tía Tula (Aunt Tula) (1921), his final large-scale novel, a work about maternity, a theme that he had already examined in Amor y pedagogía and Dos madres.

• Teresa (1924), a narrative work that contains romantic poetry, achieving an ideal through the re-creation of the beloved.

• Cómo se hace una novela (How to Make a Novel) (1927), the autopsy of an Unamuno novel.

• Don Sandalio, jugador de ajedrez (Don Sandalio, Chess Player) (1930).

• San Manuel Bueno, mártir (Saint Manuel the Good, Martyr) (1930), a brief novel that unites all of the Unamuno's thought. The novel centers on a heroic priest who has lost his faith in God.

Philosophy

Unamuno's philosophy was not systematic; it was, rather, a negation of all systems and an affirmation of faith "in itself." He developed intellectually under the influence of rationalism and positivism, but during his youth he wrote articles which clearly show his sympathy for socialism and his great concern for the situation in which he found Spain. The title of Unamuno most famous work, Tragic Sense of Life, refers to the human condition of certain death paired with the desire above all else for immortality. Later authors such as Jean-Paul Sartre reinforce this human desire for immortality, but Unamuno goes even further. According to Unamuno, not only do we desire immortality, but the immortality of our friends and family, of our homes and nations and of all aspects of life. This desire to live forever exactly as we do now is, of course, a senseless desire, but it is this desire that makes man senseless—Quixotic.

Poetry

For Unamuno, art was a way of expressing spiritual problems. His themes were the same in his poetry as he did in his novels: spiritual anguish, the pain provoked by the silence of God, time and death.

Unamuno was always attracted to traditional meters and, though his early poems did not rhyme, he turned to rhyme later in his later works.

Among his outstanding works of poetry are:

• Poesías (Poems), (1907), his first collection of poetry, where he outlined the themes that would dominate his poetics: religious conflict, Spain, and domestic life
• Rosario de sonetos líricos (Rosary of Lyric Sonnets) (1911)
• El Cristo de Velázquez (The Christ of Velazquez) (1920), a religious work, divided in four points, where Unamuno analyzes the figure of Christ from different perspectives: as a symbol of sacrifice and redemption, as a reflection on his Biblical names (Christ the myth, Christ the man on the cross, Christ, God, Christ the Eucharist), as poetic meaning, as painted by Velázquez, etc.
• Andanzas y visiones españolas (1922), something of a travel book, in which Unamuno expresses profound emotion and experiments with landscape both evocative and realistic (a theme typical of his generation of writers)
• Rimas de dentro (Rhymes from Within) (1923)
• Rimas de un poeta desconocido (Rhymes from an Unknown Poet) (1924)
• De Fuertevenra a París (From Fuertevenra to Paris) (1925)
• Romancero del destierro (Ballads of Exile) (1928)
• Cancionero (Songbook) (1953), published posthumously.

Drama

Unamuno's dramatic production presents a philosophical progression. These such as individual spirituality, faith as a "vital lie", and the problem of a double personality were at the center of La esfinge (1898), La verdad (Truth), (1899), and El otro (The Other), (1932). In 1934, he wrote El hermano Juan o El mundo es teatro (Brother Juan or The World is a Theater).

Unamuno's theater is schematic: he did away with artifice and focused only on the conflicts and passions that affect the characters. This austerity was influenced by classical Greek theater. What mattered to him was the presentation of the drama going on inside of the characters, because he understood the novel as a way of gaining knowledge about life.

By symbolizing passion and creating a theater austere both in word and presentation, Unamuno's theater opened the way for the rennaisance of Spanish theater undertaken by Ramón del Valle-Inclán, Azorín, and Federico García Lorca.