Literary Movements: Realism, Naturalism, Modernism, and the Generation of ’98

Realism is characterized by a focus mainly on characters of the bourgeoisie. It is a reflection of the bourgeoisie, often in novel form, and seeks to portray social reality accurately and objectively through credible descriptions. This is based on meticulous observation of reality. The authors usually use a realistic, omniscient point of view, and the author’s comments are frequent to influence the reader’s opinion. Also striking is the use of a natural style and colloquial language.

Naturalism takes Realism to extremes. Based on the scientific method and determinism, it frequently resorts to unusual or unpleasant environments and characters, as well as a strict application of the scientific method.

The realistic novel is very popular. Its intention was to faithfully represent society and environments. Among others, it is noted as reasons for their success: increasing the population that is literate goes from 5% to about 40%, inclusion in newspapers of serialized novels, and the birth of the serialized novel. Thus, novels reach even the lower classes.

Benito Pérez Galdós

Benito Pérez Galdós is the realist writer who wrote the most. Galdós had the great merit of his art by drawing a picture of Spanish society of his time. He exceeded the regional customs of others, and it is the division of progressives and traditionalists, with the only solution proposed being tolerance and harmony.

Leopoldo Alas Clarín

Among his critical work, his essays should be stressed. As a literary critic, he was a fierce advocate of Galdós.

Traditionally, writers at the end and beginning of the century have been divided into two distinct groups: Modernism and the Generation of ’98. However, despite the differences between modernists and men of ’98, the separation is not so clear. First, some members of the Generation of ’98—such as A. Machado and R. Del Valle—could, for some of their works, be in Modernism. Secondly, both lived in an environment and atmosphere that united them. They were “new people” with a new aesthetic that broke with the 19th century. All argued for a profound renewal of language that would bring new expressive possibilities, and also adopted a critical stance against social norms and the political situation.

Born in 1875 in Seville, Antonio Machado y Ruiz was a student at the Free Institution of Education. In Paris (1902), he met Rubén Darío, with whom he shared bonds of mutual admiration. The publication of Solitudes (1903) revealed him as an extraordinary poet. In 1907, he obtained the chair of French at the Instituto de Soria. There, he took a major step in his life. In 1909, he married Leonor Izquierdo, a girl of 16 years, but three years later, in 1912, she died in Soria. Antonio, desperate, left the Castilian city and moved to Baeza. But his heart remained in Soria.

Pío Baroja was born in San Sebastián and lived for most of his life in Madrid. He studied medicine and received his doctorate with a thesis on pain. Baroja’s ideology must be considered inseparable from his temperament. The ideas about man and the world that emerged from his works fall perfectly in line with existential pessimism. Baroja is characteristic of his radical religious, social, and economic skepticism. For Baroja, the world is meaningless, life seems absurd, and he harbors no confidence in man. This conception is rooted in Schopenhauer, the philosopher most widely read and admired by Baroja, and is reflected in his works and characters.

His political ideology is marked by the same skepticism. Despite his youthful contacts with anarchism, what really attracted him was the rebellion itself, the crushing momentum of established society. He rejected communism, socialism, and democracy and quickly ducked into radical skepticism, becoming a supporter of a proclaimed smart dictatorship. Amid these contradictory ideas, perhaps the most appropriate definition would be “radical liberal.”

Pío Baroja was the most important contemporary novelist for his extraordinary gifts as a storyteller. His later influence has been enormous, and postwar novelists always recognized him as their master. He was a prolific writer. His novels number more than sixty. He himself brought together many of his novels in trilogies (34), but these classifications, with some exceptions, often bear no relation between the works within them.