Spanish Postwar Narrative: Evolution and Key Authors

Postwar Spanish Literature

The Spanish Civil War marked a significant rupture in Spanish cultural development. Following the conflict, the national outlook was shaped by the following circumstances:

• Spain entered a period of deep isolation.
• The Generation of '27 was dismantled; Federico García Lorca was executed, and those who remained in Spain became the primary references for the war's impact.
• The war setting fostered escapism and generated specific thematic trends.

The Postwar Spanish Narrative

The Civil War caused a deep rift with earlier traditions, establishing a clear relationship between the postwar novel and nineteenth-century realism.

The 1940s

Literature during this decade was disturbing and filled with anxiety, best exemplified by Camilo José Cela's La Familia de Pascual Duarte (1942).

The 1950s

A generation of storytellers emerged, sharing ideological, thematic, and formal principles. Their goal was to offer testimony of the Spanish reality through an ethical and civic consciousness, with narrators reflecting the environment objectively.

Themes and Styles

The protagonists are typically loners living in isolation within their neighborhoods or social groups. This loneliness stems from the disconnect between rich and poor, country and city, and town and state. The style is characterized by deliberate lexical poverty and a focus on superficial aspects.

Camilo José Cela (1916-2002)

Cela is considered the initiator of tremendismo with the 1942 publication of La Familia de Pascual Duarte. His second major work is The Hive (La Colmena). In 1989, he received the Nobel Prize for Literature.

Evolution of the Narrative

The narrative landscape evolved through three major phases:

1. Overcoming Realism

1962 is considered the start of this phase, marked by the release of Time of Silence and The City and the Dogs. This change was driven by the influence of the Generation of '26 and based on:

• Reader fatigue regarding the social novel.
• Disappointment with the social function of the novel.
• The influence of the American novel and the rediscovery of exiled writers.

2. The Novel up to 1968

A new generation of storytellers emerged, born and educated during the postwar years. These authors, who participated in university protests against Franco in 1968 and 1975, moved away from the social novel to focus on structural research and reflections on the art of fiction.

3. Narrative Since 1975

Since 1975, the literary landscape has become more complex:

• Works previously censored in Spain were published abroad.
• The narrative of exiled authors was recovered.
• Foreign works previously banned were translated.

The first years of democracy brought a surge in the political novel. This scenario benefited from the coexistence of different generations of writers: from the Generation of '36 (Cela and Miguel Delibes) to the '50s (Juan Marsé) and the '68 generation (Eduardo Mendoza). The current narrative scene features a wide variety of topics and high formal quality.