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Spanish author,
philosopher, and
educator,
predecessor of
Existentialist
philosophy with
Søren Kierkegaard.
Unamuno was one of
the foremost
representatives of
the movement
Generation '98
(see also:
Ángel Ganivet).
Main themes in
Unamuno's work are
the conflict between
life and thought,
the tension between
reason and Christian
faith, and the
tragedy of death in
man's life, in which
reason offers no
consolation. As a
philosopher Unamuno
did not create a
systematic
presentation of his
thought. He objected
strongly to academic
philosophers and
stressed that the
deepest of all human
desires is the
hunger for personal
immortality against
all our rational
knowledge of life.
Unamuno wrote his
works in Spanish,
although his mother
tongue was Basque.
His essays had a
great influence in
early 20th-century
Spain.
"The man of flesh and blood; the one who is born, suffers and
dies - above all,
who dies; the man
who eats and drinks
and plays and sleeps
and thinks and
wills; the man who
is seen and is
heard; the brother,
the real brother."
(from The Tragic Sense of Life, 1913)
Miguel de Unamuno y
Jugo was born in
Bilbao as the third
of six children of
Félix Unamuno, a
proprietor of a
bakery shop, and
Salomé de Jugo, who
was also his niece.
When his father
died, Unamuno was
brought up by an
uncle. In his
childhood he
witnessed the
violence between
traditionalist and
progressive forces
during the siege of
Bilbao. This
experience left deep
traces in his
political thinking.
Unamuno studied in
his native city at
the Colegio de San
Nicolás and the
Instituto Vizacaíno.
In 1880 he entered
the University of
Madrid, where he
studied philosophy
and letters,
receiving his Ph.D.
four years later.
Unamuno's
dissertation dealt
with the origin and
prehistory of his
Basque ancestors.
Unamuno's early
years were deeply
religious, but in
Madrid he started to
visit the Ateneo,
sometimes called the
blasphemy center of
the city. In its
library he read
works of liberal
writers. After
completing his
doctorate, Unamuno
worked as a private
tutor in Bilbao,
where he also
founded with his
friends the
socialist journal
La Lucha de Clases.
From Bilbao he moved
to Salamanca, to
assume the chair of
Greek at the
University. In 1891
he married
Concepción Lizárraga
Ecénnarro; they had
ten children. In
1896-97 he went
through a religious
crisis, which
shattered his belief
in finding a
rational explanation
of God and meaning
in life. From
universal
philosophical
constructions and
outer reality, he
turned his attention
to the individual
person, inner
spiritual struggles
in the face of
questions of death
and immortality.
Unamuno once stated:
"Wisdom is to
science what death
is to life or, if
you will, wisdom is
to death what
science is to life."
Seeing that reason
leads to despair,
Unamuno concluded
that one must
abandon all pretence
of rationalism and
embrace faith.
In 1901 Unamuno
became rector of the
university; he held
the post
intermittently until
his death. For the
first time he was
relieved of his
duties in 1914 due
to political
reasons. In 1924 he
was exiled to
Fuerteventura in the
Canary Islands for
opposing the
military
dictatorship of
General Primo de
Rivera. After a few
months, he escaped
to Paris, where his
friends helped him
create attention
internationally to
his exile. He then
settled in Hendaye,
the French Basque
town nearest to the
Spanish frontier,
where he spent five
years. General
Rivera died in 1930
and Unamuno returned
to the University of
Salamanca, and was
reelected rector in
1931. He worked as
professor of the
history of the
Spanish language,
but in 1936 he was
removed once again -
this time denouncing
Francisco Franco's
Falangists. Unamuno
was placed under
house arrest. He
died in Salamanca on
December 31, 1936, a
few months after the
outbreak of the
Spanish Civil War.
Unamuno mastered 14
languages. In order
to read Kierkegaard
in the original
language he learned
Danish. Among his
major works are DEL
SENTIMIENTO TRÁGICO
DE LA VIDA EN LOS
HOMBRES Y EN LOS
PUEBLOS (1913), an
example of his
longing to find some
assurance of
immortality, ABEL
SÁNCHEZ: UNA
HISTORIA DE PASIÓN
(1917), a modern
exploration of the
Cain-and-Abel theme
and the effects of
hatred, EL CHRISTO
DE VELÁZQUEZ (1920),
meditations on
Velazquez' painting
in the Prado, the
Crucifiction.
Unamuno's highly
concentrated poems,
written between 1928
and 1936, were
published in
CANCIENERO (1953).
The poetic novella
Saint Manuel
Bueno, Martyr
(1931) focuses on a
country priest, Don
Manuel Bueno, who
doesn't believe in
afterlife. Don
Manuel continues to
take care of his
parishioners,
revealing his tragic
secret only to a few
people before his
death. In NEBLA
(1914, Mist) Unamuno
presents the reader
with a multitude of
characters in an
unnamed town.
Unamuno himself
takes the role of
God - he has created
his characters. One
of them is Augusto
Pérez, who decides
to commit suicide.
Before it he meets
the author, his
creator, and
realizes that he is
a fictive person, a
shadow destined to
vanish in the mist.
Augusto rebels
against Unamuno, and
dies - perhaps by
suicide or because
of disappointment in
love.
As an essayist
Unamuno's career
began in the
mid-1880s under the
spell of German
ideological
romanticism and
positivism. From
this period dates EN
TORNO AL CASTICISMO
(1895), a series of
essays, in which he
attempted to define
Spain's character
and its collective
psychology. He was
briefly interested
in Marxism, but by
1917 he became
openly anti-Marxist.
A religious crisis
in 1897 broke
Unamuno's trust in
the power of science
and progress.
According to Unamuno,
"It is not our ideas
which make us
optimists or
pessimists, but our
optimism and
pessimism, derived
as much from
physiological or
perhaps pathological
origins, which makes
our ideas" (from
Del sentimiento
trágico de la vida,
1913).
Sentimiento (the
tragic sense of
life), arising from
our desire for
immortality and from
the certainty of
death, is no
exception although
it can be
corroborated by
rational beliefs.
Unamuno's most
famous sonnet, 'La
oración del ateo'
(The Atheist's
Prayer), closes with
the lines: "Sufro yo
a tu costa, / Dios
no existente, pues
si Tú existieras /
existiría yo también
de veras." (Because
of You I suffer,
Inexistent God,
since if You existed
I too would really
exist.)
Unamuno's articles
written during the
Spanish Republic
(1931-36) reveal a
liberal, who
welcomed secular
legislation but yet
wished to preserve
some traditional
religious values.
Unamuno caused a
great stir with his
attacks on
casticismo, the
dominance of the
Castilian center
over other regions,
such as the Basque.
He was against
bullfights and was
often horrified by
the devastation he
saw imposed by the
modern age on the
genuine Spanish
peasant.
One of Unamuno's
most stimulating
works is The Life
of Don Quixote and
Sancho (1905),
in which the heroic
and tragic knight
assumes the virtues
of Christ. Quixote
is the
crystallization of
our wish to overcome
our destiny. With
his unyielding will
to create new
spiritual values in
the world of
materialism, Don
Quixote finally
solves his
existentialist
quest: "I know who I
want to be." In an
introductory essay
called 'The
Sepulchre of Don
Quixote,' the
Spaniards are asked
to find Don
Quixote's tomb, and
after many
wandering, they
conclude that there
is no tomb, that
they must think Don
Quixote only as the
incarnation of the
Spanish mind.
Unamuno draws
parallels between
Don Quixote and the
life of the founder
of the Jesuit order,
Ignatius of Loyola.
Unamuno's thoughts
influenced among
others the Nobel
writer
Juan Ramón Jiménez
(1881-1958) and
Antonio Machado y
Ruiz (1874-1947).
The English writer
Graham Greene
said in his book of
memoir, Ways of
Escape (1980),
that he had read
Life and Death of
Don Quixote and
forgotten it, but
after publishing the
short story 'A Visit
to Morin', and later
the novel A
Burnt-Out Case
(1961), he noted
that he shared the
same distrust of
theology. "Faith
which does not doubt
is dead faith," was
Unamuno's argument.
And in Ways of
Escape Greene
stated: "The
Catholic solution of
our problems, of our
unique vital problem
of the immortality
and eternal
salvation of the
individual soul,
satisfies the will,
and therefore
satisfies life; but
the attempts to
rationalize it by
means of dogmatic
theology fail to
satisfy reason. And
the reason has its
exigencies as
imperious as those
of life."
Generación del 98:
cultural movement,
born after the
Spanish-American War
(1898). In was an
attempted to
reestablish the lost
values of Spanish
life through
education and
through opposition
to all forms of
provincialism. At
the same time the
movement embraced
Spanish people,
medieval and Arab
heritage, and sought
to introduce
modernist influences
to literature. Most
prominent members of
the group were
Antonio Machado,
Ángel Ganivet y
García, Ramon Pérez
de Ayala, Jacinto
Benavente, Ramon
Valle-Inclán, Juan
Ramón Jiménez, Pío
Baroja, Miguel de
Unamuno, and José
Martínez Ruiz, who
was the first to
identify the
Generation of '98 as
a group..
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