miguel de unamuno

Textkit Community Open Board
1

anyone familiar with his works? i’m doing an independent study on him next semester, and curious to see if any works stand out for you…

thanks,
noah

2

I really enjoyed San Manuel Bueno, Martir about the atheist/agonist priest.

There are very few Spanish philosophers. Unamuno and Santayana are probably the only names that anyone would recognize and Santayana lived in the United States and wrote in English at that. I don’t believe that Unamuno ever wrote anything that would be considered professional philosophy. I’m sure Wiki and other sources on the internet can do better summaries on Unamuno than I. I enjoyed reading him in college and one of these day, after I’ve learned Greek and Latin, I’ll get back to Spanish literature.

3

There’s also Francisco Suárez, Jaime Balmes and José Ortega y Gasset. :sunglasses:

4

I read The Tragic Sense of Life almost ten years ago. I think I liked it then.

5

Unamuno wanted to be remembered as a poet, so here’s a perfect sonnet by him with a Promethean theme:

A mi buitre

Este buitre voraz de ceño torvo
que me devora las entrañas fiero
y es mi único y constante compañero
labra mis penas con su pico corvo.

El día en que le toque el postrer sorbo
apurar de mi negra sangre, quiero
que me dejéis con él solo y señero
un momento, sin nadie como estorbo.

Pues quiero, triunfo haciendo mi agonía,
mientras él mi último despojo traga,
sorprender en sus ojos la sombría

mirada al ver la suerte que le amaga
sin esta presa en que satisfacía
el hambre atroz que nunca se le apaga.

6

I’m in a small seminar on Unamuno right now and I really like it.

We’ve read the “Tragic Sense of Life,” “Abel Sanchez,” “The Madness of Doctor Montarco,” “San Manuel Bueno, Martyr”. The last thing we are reading is his novella “Mist”.

I think “Tragic Sense” is by far the most important of his works. I enjoy his fiction, but personally I’d rather read his philosophy. It’s very moving and non-traditional. Highly recommended.

Of interest to us here: Unamuno mastered 14 languages and was a professor of classical languages. His native language was Basque.