Mercedes Rodoreda and Llorenç Villalonga: Life and Works
Mercedes Rodoreda (1908-1983)
The Spanish Civil War profoundly influenced Mercedes Rodoreda’s narrative style. Her life can be divided into three stages: her youth (before the war), her maturity (during and after exile), and her later years (after returning from exile).
Rodoreda was born in the Sant Gervasi district of Barcelona. She was the only daughter in a close-knit, Catalan-speaking family. She only attended school for three years, receiving most of her education at home. Her father instilled in her a love for the Catalan language, and her grandfather taught her to appreciate the flowers in the family garden, a setting that would become important in her short stories and novels.
At the age of 20, she married her uncle. After the birth of their only son, the couple separated. This personal failure led her to seek solace in literature.
Among her early novels, Aloma stands out, inspired by autobiographical elements.
Key Characteristics of Her Work:
- Realism: The presence of everyday reality.
- Psychologism: The impact of events on the characters’ consciousness.
- Symbolism: The frequent use of symbols.
- Female Protagonists: Typically, women in conflict with the world, especially with men, escaping the memory of a happy past and building worlds apart from reality.
- Negative View of Men: Characterized by selfishness and the use of sex as a form of domination over women.
- Lyricism: Expressed through poetic language.
After the war, Rodoreda went into exile, first in France and then in Switzerland. These years of silence were productive in terms of literary activity, resulting in works such as Twenty-two Stories, The Diamond Square, and The Broken Mirror.
The Diamond Square
The Diamond Square tells the story of Natalia through three historical periods:
- Pre-War Period: Natalia marries Quimet, a man with a dominant personality, who renames her Colometa.
- War Period: The situation is exacerbated by her husband’s death at the front and the economic hardships that make it difficult to feed her children.
- Post-War Period: Natalia stabilizes her life by marrying Antonio, a grocer.
Llorenç Villalonga (1897-1980)
Born into an aristocratic family in rural Majorca, Llorenç Villalonga combined his profession as a psychiatrist with his literary pursuits. His body of work includes novels, short story collections, plays, and newspaper articles.
He gained recognition as a novelist with Death of a Lady, a significant novel that portrays the social reality of his time. The work mocks the aristocratic social class to which he belonged. The novel caused a scandal in Majorcan society, leading to backlash. His anti-Catalan articles and Falange membership were also controversial.
After the war, his attitude changed, and he embraced the Catalan language. His novel Bearn or The Room of Dolls, is a deeply Majorcan story about a childless aristocratic marriage. The narrator uses standard Catalan, while the characters use the Majorcan dialect in their dialogues.
Influenced by Marcel Proust, Villalonga’s works are highly autobiographical.