Correspondence
A LITERARY LEITER FROM MADRID.
[To the Editor of the SPECTATOR.]
Sur,—Your Paris correspondent, in the interesting letter recently published in the Spedator, pointed out the tendency of modern French authors to write of the elemental things, preferring the peasant to the intellectual, the country to the town. In Spain, this tendency has always been most marked ; her greatest writers have been preoccupied with the mentality of the sons of the soil, have been under the spell of the country and the people immortalized by the pen of Cervantes and the pencil of El Greco. If there be any new tendency in these days, it is to be found in the inclination to study the works of foreign writers, in a new literary curiosity, and, especially, in placing the scene of the story in the drawing-room rather than in the field.
Although deriving much from the French school, the Spanish writers have always been original, racy of the soil, and introspective. "La raze" has always been a word to conjure with, whether it be used in jest, as typifying some national weakness, or in earnest as setting forth some national virtue.
In these days young writers are looking abroad for inspira- tion and are studying the works of foreign authors. They have taken much from Proust, have studied the Russian novelists, and have established quite a cult for the work of that strange child of genius, Arthur Rimbaud. Another recent development is the interest taken in Portuguese literature, while a Portuguese writer, Fidelino de Figueiredo, has been writing a series of articles on outstanding Spanish writers in El Debate.
Of the writers who are already well known in England there is little new to say. D. Jacinto Benevento, the great playwright, has just produced a new play ; D. R. Valle Inclan has written an historical novel treating of the Court of Isabel II., which he calls The Court of the Miracles. Pio Baroja continues to occupy an important position. Women novelists are in the minority, but there are some who have achieved fame. Concha Espina, novelist and poet, a tem- peramental writer, Blanca de los Rios, who paints the inter- national literary society of Madrid, and Isabel de Palencia, novelist and lecturer, are perhaps the best known.
Although writers do not make fortunes in Spain, their works are read, even when, as in a recent ease, the author clothed his novel in blank verse. Leaving aside the works of Gabriel Miro, Pedro Salinas, Juan Chabas and many other notable writers (including the very interesting Cry in the Night of Pedro Mata), let us concentrate on a couple of typical books. First, El Torero Caracho of Ramon Gomez de la Sema, "Ramon," as his many friends call him, is one of the most popular writers in Madrid. He has many imitators among the younger generation and many admirers among the older. A disciple of that Larra who wrote of the Madrid of his day, Ramon de la Serna has specialized in all that concerns "the Court," as modern writers still call the capital of Spain. As a journalist and chronicler of old Madrid, he made his mark before attempting actual full-length fiction ; his latest novel is certainly his best. It is more carefully constructed than others that I have read, more consecutive and less diffuse ; it holds the interest all through and presents a perfectly true; unadorned picture of a bull-fighter's life. In its pages the Madrid that the writer knows so well stands out in high relief—and he knows it intimately from the Rag Market to the Puerta del Sol.
We are introduced to Caracho as a naughty little boy, who used to earn pennies by shouting out insulting remarks in the Bull Ring at the bidding of a certain ColoneL whose lungs were not so strong as those of his proxy. Caracho manages to learn the art of the torero, paying his way by means of money gained when carrying about an ambulant peepshow. He buys his first gala costume in the Rag Market. Little by little he makes his way, runs away with the daughter of a fameus torero, works his way up until he supplants his father-in-law, who retires and goes to live in a farm in Torrelodones, where he breeds "toms bravos." Caracho is cool, brave, clever ; he becomes the idol of Madrid. The different occasions in which he appears in the Ring are told in detail ; they differ each to other, as each bull differs in his attack and in the manner 4 his final discomfiture. Caracho is not always the hero of the episode ; he has his bad moments. Sometimes acclaimed with frenzy by the vast multitude that throng the benches of the great amphitheatre, .he is on more than one occasion the object of their fury.
Before his final and fatal fight he prays to the Virgin to protect him, kisses her image with fervour and mounts the carriage that is to bear him to the Ring. It is a great occasion and the whole population seem to be swarming in the direction of the further end of the long Calle de Alealit. It is interesting; because Caracho's rival Cairel, the other popular idol, is sup- posed to be going to retire into a monastery after the end of the season. Cairel, with his saintly expression and his azure cloak, is the exact opposite to Caracho, who represents the earthly hero.
The first bull falls to Cairel, the third to Caracho, the fourth to Cairel, the fifth is a black bull that does not give much trouble ; the sixth, the fatal "tor, bravisimo," des- tined to avenge his own and his companions' slaughter. The evening is falling, a cold breeze springs up, the newly sanded arena hardly hides the pools of blood. Caracho missed his opportunity and is gored and carried from the arena. Then Cairel comes on to avenge his rival and dances to his own death. He is killed and carried away. The gloom deepens ; the people cry for the bull to be haltered and taken away. Suddenly a youth appears, dressed in the black alpaca dress of an attendant ; he despatches the terrible bull and receives a tremendous ovation. " Sefior Presidente ! Both ears ! And the tail ! And the tongue ! " Madrid has a new idol. And so the story ends.
A feature of Spanish fiction is the short story, sometimes reaching a length which is rare in other countries, that of the short novel. In Flame and Ashes Alvaro de Alcaltt-Galiano writes with all his accustomed skill and distinction, giving utl four cameos taken from different spheres of Spanish life. In the Drama in Marble we have the tragedy of lives spoiled by the adoption into a family of a Russian dancer, in the second, Glory, the psychology of a Bolshevik assassin; and in the last that of a derelict Spanish Count, marooned is Monte Carlo, whose daughter attempts to redeem him.
The Gaceta Literaria published a suggestion lately con- cerning the advisability of establishing a Spanish Literary Academy, which should be more elastic than the Royal Academy of the Language, and have for members foreigner( as well as such great names as Unamuno, Perez de Ayala Ortega y Gasset, and so on. It is a worthy idea, no doubt; and reminds us that we in England have no Academy of Letters.—I am, Sir, .te..
BEATRICH EasKINE. -
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