Ayala, Francisco (de Paula y Garcia Duarte) 1906-
AYALA, Francisco (de Paula y Garcia Duarte) 1906-
PERSONAL: Born March 16, 1906, in Granada, Spain; son of Francisco and Luz (Garcia Duarte) Ayala; married Etelvina Silva Vargas, 1932; children: one daughter. Education: University of Madrid, LL.B., 1929; studied in Germany, 1929-30; University of Madrid, doctorate in law, 1932.
ADDRESSES: Agent—c/o Clan Libros, Nicaragua, 17, 28016 Madrid, Spain.
CAREER: Essayist, novelist, short story writer, critic, and journalist. Revista de Occidente, critic, 1927-30; editor of Revista de Occidente and La Gaceta Literaria; University of Madrid, Madrid, Spain, professor of law, 1932-35; counsel to Spanish Parliament, c. 1933-36; Spanish Republic's ambassador to Czechoslovakia, 1937; University of Puerto Rico, professor, 1950-56; professor at various universities in the United States, including New York University, University of Chicago, Bryn Mawr College, and Rutgers University, 1956-76; New York University, New York, NY, King Juan Carlos I of Spain Professor of Spanish Culture and Civilization, 1987-88. U.S. representative to the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO).
MEMBER: Spanish Royal Academy.
AWARDS, HONORS: National Critic's Prize, 1972; National Literature Prize, 1983; National Prize for Spanish Letters for overall literary achievement, 1988; Miguel de Cervantes National Literary Prize, 1991; nominee for the Nobel Prize for literature and the Juan Rulfo Prize.
WRITINGS:
Tragicomedia de un hombre sin espíritu, Industrial Gráfica (Madrid, Spain), 1925.
Historia de un atardecer, Industrial Gráfica (Madrid, Spain), 1926.
El boxeador y un ángel, Cuadernos Literarios (Madrid, Spain), 1929.
Indagación del cinema (title means "Inquiry into Cinema"), Mundo Latino (Madrid, Spain), 1929.
Cazador en el alba, Ulises (Madrid, Spain), 1930.
El derecho social en la constitución de la república Española, Minuesa de los Rios (Madrid, Spain), 1932.
Los derechos individuales como garantía de la libertad, Minuesa de los Rios (Madrid, Spain), 1935.
El pensamiento vivo de Saavedra Fajardo, Losada (Buenos Aires, Argentina), 1941.
El problema del liberalismo, Fondo de Cultura Economica (Panuco, Mexico), 1941.
Oppenheimer, Fondo de Cultura Economica (Panuco, Mexico), 1942.
Historia de la libertad, Editorial Atlantida (Buenos Aires, Argentina), 1943.
(With Renato Treves) Una doble experiencia política: España e Italia, Colegio de México, Centro de Estudios Sociales (Mexico City, Mexico), 1944.
Ensayo sobre la libertad, Colegio de México, Centro de Estudios Sociales (Mexico City, Mexico), 1944.
El hechizado (title means "The Bewitching"; also see below), Emecé Editores (Buenos Aires, Argentina), 1944.
Histrionismo y representación: ejemplos y pretextos, Editorial Sudamericana (Buenos Aires, Argentina), 1944.
Los politicos, Editorial Depalma (Buenos Aires, Argentina), 1944.
Razón del mundo: Un exámen de conciencia intellectual, Losada (Buenos Aires, Argentina), 1944.
Jovellanos, Losada (Buenos Aires, Argentina), 1945.
Tratado de sociología, Losada (Buenos Aires, Argentina), 1947.
La cabeza del cordero, Losada (Buenos Aires, Argentina), 1949.
Los usurpadores (short stories; includes "El Hechizado"), Editorial Sudamericana (Buenos Aires, Argentina), 1949, translation by Carolyn Richmond published as The Usurpers, Schocken (New York, NY), 1987.
La invención del Quijote: Discurso leído en la fiesta de la lengua española celebrada en la Universidad de Puerto Rico el día 24 de abril de 1950, Editorial Universitaria (Rio Piedras, Puerto Rico), 1950.
Ensayos de sociología política: En qué mundo vivimos, Instituto de Investigaciones Sociales, Universidad Nacional (Mexico City, Mexico), 1951.
Introducción a las ciencias socials, Instituto de Investigaciones Sociales, Universidad Nacional (Mexico City, Mexico), 1952.
Derechos de la persona individual para una sociedad de masas, Editorial Perrot (Buenos Aires, Argentina), 1953.
Historia de macacos, Revista de Occidente (Madrid, Spain), 1955.
Breve teoría de la traducción, Obregón (Mexico City, Mexico), 1956.
El escritor en la sociedad en masas, Obregón (Mexico City, Mexico), 1956.
La crisis actual de la enseñanza, Editorial Nova (Buenos Aires, Argentina), 1958.
La integración social en América, Editorial Perrot (Buenos Aires, Argentina), 1958.
Muertes de perro (novel), Editorial Sudamericana (Buenos Aires, Argentina), 1958, translation by Joan Maclean published as Death as a Way of Life, Macmillan (New York, NY), 1964.
Tecnología y libertad, Taurus (Madrid, Spain), 1959.
Experiencia e invención: (Ensayos sobre el escritor y su mundo), Taurus (Madrid, Spain), 1960.
El fondo del vaso (sequel to Muertes de perro), Editorial Sudamericana (Buenos Aires, Argentina), 1962.
El as de bastos, Editorial Sur (Buenos Aires, Argentina), 1963.
De este mundo y el otro, E.D.H.A.S.A. (Barcelona, Spain), 1963.
La evasión de los intelectuales, Centro de Estudios y Documentación Sociales (Mexico City, Mexico), 1963.
Realidad y ensueño, Editorial Gredos (Madrid, Spain), 1963.
España a la fecha, Editorial Sur (Buenos Aires, Argentina), 1965.
Mis páginas mejores, Editorial Gredos (Madrid, Spain), 1965.
El rapto, La Novela Popular (Madrid, Spain), 1965, English edition edited by Phyllis Zatlin published as El rapto, Harcourt Brace (New York, NY), 1971.
Cuentos, Anaya (Salamanca, Spain), 1966.
De raptos, violaciones y otras inconveniencias, Alfaguara (Madrid, Spain), 1966.
Hacia una semblanza de Quevedo, Bedia (Santander, Spain), 1969.
Obras narrativas completas, Aguilar (Mexico City, Mexico), 1963.
El cine: arte y espectáculo, Universidad Veracruzana (Xalapa, Mexico), 1966.
Reflexiones sobre la estructura narrativa, Taurus (Madrid, Spain), 1970.
El jardín de las delicias, Editorial Seix Barral (Barcelona, Spain), 1971.
El Lazarillo: Nuevo exámen de algunos aspectos, Taurus (Madrid, Spain), 1971.
Confrontaciones, Editorial Seix Barral (Barcelona, Spain), 1972.
Los ensayos: Teoría y crítica literaria, Aguilar (Mexico City, Mexico), 1972.
Hoy ya es ayer, Moneda y Crédito (Madrid, Spain), 1972.
Cervantes y Quevedo, Editorial Seix Barral (Barcelona, Spain), 1974.
La novela: Galdós y Unamuno, Editorial Seix Barral (Barcelona, Spain), 1974.
El escritor y el cine, Ediciones del Centro, (Madrid, Spain), 1975.
El escritor y su imagen (Ortega y Gasset, Azorín, Valle-Inclán, Antonio Machado), Ediciones Guadarrama (Madrid, Spain), 1975.
(Editor) Dictionario Atlantico, Editorial Sudamericana (Buenos Aires, Argentina), 1977.
Galdós en su tiempo, Universidad Internacional Menéndez Pelayo (Santander, Spain), 1978.
De raptos, violaciones, macacos y demás inconveniencias, Editorial Seix Barral (Barcelona, Spain), 1982.
De triunfos y penas, Editorial Seix Barral (Barcelona, Spain), 1982.
Recuerdos y olvidos: 1. Del paraíso al destierro, Alianza (Madrid, Spain), 1982.
Palabras y letras, Edhasa, (Barcelona, Spain), 1983.
Recuerdos y olvidos: 2. El exilio, Alianza (Madrid, Spain), 1983.
La estructura narrativa y otras experiencias literarias, Editorial Crítica (Barcelona, Spain), 1984.
La retórica del periodismo, Real Academia Espanola (Madrid, Spain), 1984.
La imagen de España: continuidad y cambio en la sociedad española: (papeles para un curso), Alianza (Madrid, Spain), 1986.
El jardín de las malicias, Montena (Madrid, Spain), 1988.
Mi cuarto a espadas, El Pais (Madrid, Spain), 1988.
Las plumas del fénix: Estudios de literatura española, Alianza (Madrid, Spain), 1989.
El escritor en su siglo, Alianza (Madrid, Spain), 1990.
Relatos granadinos, Alianza (Madrid, Spain), 1990.
El tiempo y yo; o El mundo a la espada, Alianza (Madrid, Spain), 1992
.Contra el poder y otros ensayos, Ediciones de la Universidad (Madrid, Spain), 1992.
El regreso, Editorial Juventud (Bacelona, Spain), 1992.
Relatos, Editorial Bruño (Madrid, Spain), 1992.
Narrativa completa, Alianza (Madrid, Spain), 1993.
De mis pasos en la tierra, Aguilar (Madrid, Spain), 1996.
En qué mundo vivimos, Aguilar (Madrid, Spain), 1996.
Cuentos imaginarios, Libros Clan (Madrid, Spain), 1999.
Un caballero granadino y otros relatos, 1999.
SIDELIGHTS: Prolific Spanish writer Francisco Ayala's career began at a young age. He began writing poetry at eight, and his first novel, Tragicocomedia de un hombre sin espíritu, was published when he was only eighteen. He went on to become a critic for philosopher José Ortega y Gasset's prestigious journal, Revista de Occidente, by the time he was twenty-one. During these years, Ayala was also studying law at the University of Madrid; he received his law degree in 1929 and a Ph.D. in law in 1932, and subsequently became a professor of law and a counselor to the Spanish parliament.
Ayala published several more novels and short story collections in the 1920s and early 1930s, but in the mid-1930s he turned his attention to nonfiction works, writing a study of the new constitution of the Spanish Second Republic and other books on law and philosophy. With the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War in 1936, Ayala became the Republic's ambassador to Czechoslovakia. His father was executed by General Francisco Franco's forces during the war, and when the Republic was defeated Ayala went into exile in the Americas. He first settled in Argentina, working as a translator and continuing to write. Then, when the right-wing government of Juan Perón came to power in Argentina, Ayala left the country for Puerto Rico, and later for the United States, where he taught for many years. Ayala did not visit Spain again until 1960, although he moved back to the country to live after the death of Franco in 1975. In 1983 he was elected to the Spanish Royal Academy and was awarded the National Prize for Spanish Literature, and in 1991 he won the Miguel de Cervantes National Literary Prize, winning out over Nobel Prize laureates Camilio José Cela, Gabriel García Márquez, and Mario Vargas Llosa. The Cervantes Prize, Spain's highest literary award, recognizes a body of work "which has conspicuously enriched the literary patrimony of the Spanish speaking world."
Ayala's best-known book in the English-speaking world may be Los usurpadores, published in English as The Usurpers. This collection of short stories, written while Ayala lived in Argentina, is set in the Spain of the Middle Ages. Possibly the most-lauded tale from the collection is "The Bewitched," in which a man spends his life fighting the Spanish bureaucracy, trying to gain an audience with the king. When this man is finally permitted see the king, he finds himself in the presence of Carlos II, the monarch who was so severely mentally and physically handicapped that he could not even speak coherently, let alone rule. This story was dubbed "the gem of the . . . collection" by a Kirkus Reviews contributor, and called "a masterpiece of Hispanic literature" by famed writer Jorge Luis Borges, according to a critic for Publishers Weekly. Another notable story in the collection is "The Inquisitor," in which a former Jewish Grand Rabbi turned Catholic is so zealous in his prosecution of the Inquisition that he does not even have mercy on his only child. In the prologue to the book, Ayala explains the theme that binds the stories together: "power exercised by man over his fellow man is always a usurpation."
Many critics noted that, though Los usurpadores is set in the past, it is actually intended to critique illegitimate usurpations of power on the part of Franco and others in contemporary times. A similar critique is at the heart of Ayala's most famous novels, Muertes de perro and its sequel El fondo del vaso. Both stories are set in the same fictionalized Latin American nation, the former under the rule of a petty dictator, the latter after his fall. Although Ayala refused to identify the country that was his models for these books, they have generally been identified with Argentina and Perón.
Charles L. King, who wrote about Ayala in Encyclopedia of World Literature in the Twentieth Century, concluded: "[Ayala's] profound reflections on man's moral nature as well as on his relation to society and to the cosmos distinguish his work and provide it with an underlying and continuing unity. In Ayala, the artist and the concerned intellectual . . . fuse in rare and brilliant equilibrium."
BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:
BOOKS
Bieder, Maryellen, Narrative Perspective in the Post-Civil War Novels of Francisco Ayala, Department of Romance Languages, University of North Carolina Press (Chapel Hill, NC), 1979.
Costa, Luis, Richard Critchfield, Richard Glosan, and Wulf Koepke, editors, German and International Perspectives on the Spanish Civil War: The Aesthetics of Partisanship, Camden House (Columbia, SC), 1992.
Del Pino, Jose M., Montajes y fragmentos: Una aproximacion a la narrativa española de vanguardia, Rodopi (Amsterdam, Netherlands), 1995.
Encyclopedia of World Literature in the Twentieth Century, St. James Press (Detroit, MI), 1999.
Irizarry, Estelle, Francisco Ayala, Twayne (Boston, MA), 1977.
Julia, Mercedes, editor, Historicidad en la novela espanola contemporanea, Universidad de Cadiz (Cadiz, Spain), 1997.
Novela española actual, Fundacion Juan March & Catedra (Madrid, Spain), 1977.
Reference Guide to Short Fiction, 2nd edition, St. James Press (Detroit, MI), 1994.
Sanchez Trigueros, Antonio, and Antonio Chicharro Chamorro, editors, Francisco Ayala, teorico y critico literario, Diputacion Provincial de Granada, Biblioteca de Ensayo (Granada, Spain), 1992.
Vazquez, Medel, and Manuel Angel, editors, El universo plural de Francisco Ayala, Alfar (Seville, Spain), 1995.
PERIODICALS
American Hispanicist, Volume 4, numbers 30-31, 1978, Janet Diaz and Ricardo Landeira, "'El tajo' de Francisco Ayala: Un caso de conciencia," pp. 7-12.
Anales Cervantinos, Volume 32, 1994, p. 207.
Anales de la Literatura Española Contemporanea, 1994, p. 165.
Choice, November, 1987, E. H. Friedman, review of The Usurpers, p. 482.
Cuadernos Hispanoamericanos, Volumes 329-330, 1977, Andres Amoros, "Algunos articulos olvidados de Francisco Ayala, hace cincuenta anos," pp. 236-259, Manuel Andujar, "Francisco Ayala en signos de admiracion," pp. 288-289, Mariano Baquero Goyanes, "Cervantes y Ayala: El arte del relato breve," pp. 311-326, Estelle Irizarry, "Autor y lector ficcionalizados en obras de Francisco Ayala," pp. 327-340, German Gullon, "Degradacion y dictadura en Muertes de perro, de Francisco Ayala," pp. 329-330, Ildefonso-Maneul Gil, "Donde amistad y admiracion conflyen (homenaje a Francisco Ayala)," pp. 281-287, Jose L. Cano, "Francisco Ayala," pp. 276-280, Monique Joly, "Francisco Ayala: Ensayo de interpretacion de su obra narrativa posterior a la guerra," pp. 366-383, Rosario Hiriart, "Francisco Ayala: Vida y obra," pp. 262-275, and "Metamorfosis de una anecdota: 'Incidente,' de Francisco Ayala (un comentario de texto)," pp. 387-402, Erna Brandenberger, "Francisco Ayala y Alemania," pp. 308-310, Ricardo Gullon, "Francisco Ayala, critico literario," pp. 347-355, Agnes Gullon, "Francisco Ayala, professor," pp. 302-307, William M. Sherzer, "Ironia y nerismo en El inquisidor," pp. 477-480, Carolyn Richmond, "La complejidad estructural de El jardin de las delicias vista a traves de dos de sus piezas," pp. 403-413, Janet W. Diaz and Ricardo Landeira, "La 'historia dentro de la historia' en tres cuentos de Francisco Ayala," pp. 481-494, Nelson R. Orringer, "La mano y el centro en Los usurpadores, de Ayala," pp. 495-510, Thomas Mermall, "La pseudo-racionalidad del discurso en la narritiva de Francisco Ayala," pp. 341-346, Gonzalo Sobejano, "Lectura de el doliente," pp. 449-468, Manuel Duran, "Notas sobre Francisco Ayala, El rapto y el mito del eterno retorno," pp. 329-330, Dionisio Canas, "Objectable representacion de Francisco Ayala," pp. 300-301, Emilio Orozco Diaz, "Palabras de saludo a Francisco Ayala en su presentacion publica en Granada," pp. 290-299, Ignacio Soldevida-Durante, "Para una hermeneutica de la prosa vanguardista espanola (a proposite de Francisco Ayala)," pp. 329-330, Galvarino Plaza "Un relato de Francisco Ayala: Realidad imaginada o soledad intransferable," pp. 429-440; April, 1993, Francisco Ayala, Rosa Chacel, Rafael Alberti, Jose Bello, and Luis Garcia Mankro, roundtable discussion of the Generation of '27, p. 514; June, 2001, David Vinas Piquer, article on Francisco Ayala, p. 79.
Dactylus, Volume 12, 1993, p. 14.
Discurso Literario: Revista de Temas Hispanicos, spring, 1989, Naomi Lindstrom, "Creation in Criticism, Criticism in Creation: Four Ibero Exemplars," pp. 423-444.
Hispania, March, 1969, Janet Winecoff Diaz, review of La Cabeza del cordero, p. 70; May, 1974, John J. Staczek, review of El rapto, p. 398; September, 1971, Robert Hatton, review of El rapto, p. 613; May, 1980, Gary Eugene A. Scavinicky, review of Dictionario Atlantico, p. 447; May, 1985, Estelle Irizarry, review of La estructura narrativa y otras experiencias literarias, p. 304; May, 1987, "The Ubiquitous Trickster Archetype in the Narrative of Francisco Ayala," pp. 222-230.
Hispanic Journal, spring, 1989, Raymond Skyrme, "Substance and Shadow: The Anatomy of Self-Reflection in La cabeza del cordero,"p.95.
Hispanofila, September, 1991, Daniel E. Gulstad, "Homecoming and Identity-Quest in Ayala's La cabeza del cordero," pp. 1-15.
Insula, January, 1999, p. 625; June, 1993, p. 23.
Kirkus Reviews, April 15, 1987, review of The Usurpers, p. 572.
Letras de Deusto, Silvia Rurunat, "Francisco Ayala y el monologo interior: Un recuento," pp. 189-194.
Letras Peninsulares, spring, 1990, Mary Vasquez, "Homenaje a Francisco Ayala y Rosa Chacel," Robert Lima, "With Francisco Ayala at NYU," pp. 95-99, Janet Perez, "Francisco Ayala: The Art of Literary Recycling," pp. 139-148; Nelson R. Orringer, "Historicity and Historiography in F. Ayala's Los usurpadores," pp. 119-137.
Modern Age, summer, 1991, Noel Valis, review of The Usurpers, p. 401.
Modern Language Journal, February, 1972, Ana Maria Fagundo, review of El rapto, p. 102.
Monographic Review/Revista Monografica, Nelson R. Orringer, "The Baroque Body in Francisco Ayala's El rapto," pp. 46-59.
Neophilologus, July, 1997, p. 381.
New York Times Book Review, June 21, 1987, William Ferguson, review of The Usurpers, p. 22.
New York Times, June 19, 1983, p. 30.
Ojancano: Revista de Literatura Espanola, October, 1993, Nelson R. Orringer, "Missteps of the Comic Body in Francisco Ayala's El fondo del vaso," pp. 69-88; October, 1997, analysis of short story technique of Francisco Ayala, p. 241; April, 1998, Manuel L. Abellan, comparison of Francisco Ayala and Ramon Sender, p. 19.
Perspectives on Contemporary Literature, Volume 1, number 1, 1975, Charles Olstad, "Alienation: Theme and Technique in Francisco Ayala," pp. 96-104.
Publications of the Modern Language Association of America, Volume 84, 1969, Keith Ellis, "Cervantes and Ayala's El rapto: The Art of Reworking a Story," pp. 14-19.
Publishers Weekly, May 8, 1987, review of The Usurpers, p. 61.
Razon y Fe, July, 1999, p. 61.
Revista Canadiense de Estudios Hispanicos, autumn, 1981, Raymond Skyrme, "The Divided Self; The Language of Scission in 'El tajo' of Francisco Ayala," pp. 91-109; winter, 1990, Raymond Skyrme, "Analysis of the Visual Mode in La cabeza del cordero," pp. 293-314; fall, 1996, Francisco Ayala, article on the language of Spanish literature, p. 5; fall, 1992, Rosalia Cornejo-Parriego, analysis of the work of Francisco Ayala, p. 31.
Revista de Estudios Hispanicos, 1978, Nelson R. Orringer, "The Hand and the Scepter in Los usurpadores by Francisco Ayala," pp. 113-134; Volume 12, 1998, p. 113.
Revista Hispanica Moderna, December, 1997, p. 241.
Romance Languages Annual, 1996, p. 528.
Salina, November, 1998, Rosa Navarro Duran, review of Los Usurpadores, p. 137.
Siglo XX/20th Century, p. 25.
Spanish Royal Academy, Francisco Ayala, discourse on the lexicography and importance of the Spanish language, p. 57.
Suplemento Literario La Nacion (Buenos Aires, Argentina), April 26, 1992, Francisco Ayala, acceptance speech for the Cervantes Prize, p. 1.
Suplementos Anthropos: Materiales de Trabajo Intelectual, September, 1993, p. 3.
USF Language Quarterly, Volume 17, number 1-2, 1978, Antonio Martinez, "Dos parabolas de nuestro tiemps: 'Muertes de perro' y 'El fondo del vaso,'" pp. 48-50.
World Literature Today, summer, 1983, J. Schraibman, review of Recuerdos y Olvidos, p. 437; autumn, 1983, L. Larios Vendrell, review of Triunfos y Penas, p. 615; autumn, 1990, Terry O. Taylor, review of Las plumas del fénix: Estudios de literatura española, p. 613; spring, 1993, John Crispin, review of El tiempo y yo o El mundo a la espada, p. 339; winter, 1995, Susana Rivera, review of El rapto, p. 102.
OTHER
El poder de la palabra,http://www.epdlp.com/ (May 3, 2002).
Francisco Ayala Web site,http://www.mcu.es/ (May 3, 2002).
New York University Web site,http://www.nyu.edu/ (May 3, 2002), "Holders of the King Juan Carlos I of Spain Professorship in Spanish Culture and Civilization."
Premio Cervantes Web site,http://www.terra.es/ (May 3, 2002).
Terra,http://teleine.ole.com/ (May 3, 2002).*