Tristana by Benito Pérez Galdós at The Mookse and the Gripes

Trevor at The Mookse and the Gripes was kind enough to post my comments on the recent translation of Tristana by Benito Pérez Galdós, so please give him some click-love: the review

NYRB has provided a major service to readers by publishing Margaret Jull Costa's translation of Galdós' novel. While I really enjoyed the earlier English translation, it was expensive and mostly limited to university libraries. I'm a big fan of Galdós and I'm happy to see NYRB expanding his availability beyond scholars and weird unconventional readers.

As I mention in the post, if you haven’t read anything by Galdós, Tristana provides an interesting (and maybe problematic) introduction to the writer. It’s a book that the author seemed to dismiss before its release while many of his supporters and critics were left disappointed by the author’s unsatisfying (to them) ending. Check out the post to find out more about the book.

In the Introduction, writer and literary critic Jeremy Terglown analyzes the ambiguous wording at the end of the novel. We explore that detail in the comments. Hope to "see" you there!

And a minor point, but important for anyone wanting to read more Galdós...keep in mind he uses characters across multiple novels. From Tristana, remember the doctor Augusto (Alejandro) Miquis. The kind doctor makes appearances across many of Galdós' novels. I'll point to a previous note on him as well as the more detailed article "Manuel Tolosa Latour: prototype of Augusto Miquis" by Ruth Schmidt. Latour and Galdós were quite good friends and both men substituted the name of Miquis for Latour when writing each other.

Tristana by Benito Pérez Galdós

Tristana by Benito Pérez Galdós
Translated from the Spanish by Margaret Jull Costa
Introduction by Jeremy Terglown
(Review copy courtesy of NYRB)

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Update (4 March 2015):
I wanted to wait a month before I posted the full review. There may be some differences from Trevor's post at The Mookse and the Gripes. My notes follow:

NYRB has done a wonderful service by publishing this short 1892 novel by Benito Pérez Galdós. I reviewed the only available English translation of the novel prior to the NYRB edition, Tristana: Buñuel’s Film and Galdós’ Novel: A Case Study in the Relation Between Literature and Film by Colin Partridge (New York: The Edwin Mellen Press, 1995) and found it to be a wonderful book full of Galdosian ambiguity and irony. If you haven’t read anything by Galdós, Tristana provides an interesting (and maybe problematic) introduction to the writer. It’s a book that the author seemed to dismiss before its release while many of his supporters and critics were left disappointed by the author’s unsatisfying (to them) ending.

Tristana follows the trials and tribulations of the youthful, orphaned Tristana and the two lovers in her life. The first lover is her guardian, Don Lepe, an aging Don Juan who couldn’t resist one last conquest of the young girl. The second lover is Horacio, a painter with a similar background as Tristana. The more time Tristana spends with Horacio, the more she tends to rebel against Don Lepe. She seeks to educate herself and develop her nascent talents, dreaming of a life of independence on her own terms. An illness and infection causes her to lose a leg, dashing many of her hopes for the future.

Tristana is often at the center of events, but she rarely develops beyond superficial changes. Even though she tries to advance, personally and professionally, she is always at the mercy of circumstances. Galdós often uses names to highlight a point or provide irony, and Tristana follows that pattern. Triste means gloom or sadness, the station in life she is consigned to after her parents die and she becomes Don Lope’s ward and eventual lover. The name also alludes to the mythical Tristan and the doomed love affair with Isolde, providing a foreshadowing of Tristana’s relationship with Horacio. In one of her letters to Horacio, Tristana summarizes many beliefs she expresses over the course of the novel:

“I find the problem of my life more overwhelming the more I think about it. I want to be somebody in the world, to cultivate an art, to live by my own means. I’m so easily discouraged. Am I really attempting the impossible? I want to have a profession, and yet I’m useless, I know nothing about anything. It’s just awful.

“My ambition is to not have to depend on anyone, not even on the man I adore. I don’t want to be his mistress—so undignified—or a woman maintained by a few men purely for their amusement, like a hunting dog; nor do I want the man of my dreams to become a husband. I see no happiness in marriage. To put it in my own words, I want to be married to myself and to be my own head of the household. I wouldn’t know how to love out of obligation; I can only promise constancy and endless loyalty in a state of total freedom. I feel like protesting against men, who have appropriated the whole world for themselves and left us women only the narrowest of paths to take, the ones that were too narrow for them to walk along…” (95-6; ellipsis in original)

Tristana had met Horacio by accident, continuing to meet him in secret. Don Lope knows something is going on, but refuses to stop it, knowing that no possible lover can compare to him. On this point, he’s right, although there’s plenty of irony in it, too. Horacio’s life started similar to Tristana’s situation. He was orphaned and raised by a strict grandfather. But when his grandfather dies, Horacio achieves financial security from the inheritance, allowing him to pursue his love of painting. His bohemian life in a Madrid suburb, though, is only playacting. He’s easily distracted by Tristana. He acts like a rebel but it’s Tristana that’s the real non-conformist. Tristana is nothing like he imagined his future wife would be like. A section of the novel traces letters exchanged by the lovers during a separation, and while they are apart Tristana deifies Horacio in her mind. There’s no way Horacio can live up to Tristana’s elevation of him and he disappoints her time and again, especially during her time of illness and convalescence.

In many ways, Don Lope (or more formally, Don Juan López Garrido), the aging Don Juan, steals the novel. He follows his own perverted chivalric code. His code has so many twists and turns he can’t always keep up with what he thinks he should believe, but he devoutly adheres to it just the same. He believes the younger generation vastly inferior to his own, yet he also acknowledges his declining health and virility. Tristana remarks on the dual consciences of Don Lope, who behaves like nobility or someone from the gutter depending on the situation. In a way, Don Lope drives Tristana into Horacio’s arms (and eventually his bed), but he knows she will return to him. He is able to triumph using his wiles and experience. Early on in the novel, the narrator (with a touch of Galdós’ irony) puts Don Lope in the dock and judges him:

If hell did not exist, it would be necessary to create one just for Don Lope, so that he could spend an eternity doing penance for his mockery of morality and thus serve as a perennial lesson for the many who, while without openly declaring themselves to be his supporters, are nonetheless to be found throughout this sinful world of ours. (18)

Each of the three main characters claims to be a rebel in their own way. Don Lope holds himself outside of social institutions until poverty and old age change his ways. Tristana assets what she views as her rights—of education, of vocation, of shunning marriage—until she falls back on an offer of security. Horacio plays the bohemian until he discovers the joys of the landed gentry. Everyone relapses into the existing social power structures, but Tristana is the only one that doesn’t have a real choice in the matter.

In many of his novels Galdós was very critical of late 19th-century Spanish society, pointing out the limited roles available to women. Galdós’ former lover, novelist and activist Emilia Pardo Bazán, was vocal about her regret that Galdós failed to develop and focus on what she saw as the central concern of the novel—Tristana’s (and thus many Spanish women’s) loneliness and isolation due to the limited choices available to her. Bazán was especially disappointed in the heroine losing power while a traditional arrangement wins in the end. As Colin Partridge put it in his essay accompanying his translation, Galdós could have made Tristana a successful woman, like Theodore Dreiser’s Carrie Meeber, a novel released at about the same time as Tristana, but the Madrid of the time didn’t afford the same opportunities as Chicago or New York. Galdós remains faithful to real life, avoiding an easy ideological resolution that would ring false.

As the Spanish critic and author Clarín (Leopoldo Alas) pointed out, Tristana’s immaturity and lack of development occurs because she is at the mercy of forces much more powerful than she could hope to overcome. She is doomed to non-fulfillment because of the imposed social conventions. In this way Tristana is very much like Alas’ heroine Ana Ozores in La Regenta, released just a few years later (and there are several more similarities in La Regenta found in Tristana, such as rapid aging in older men, seemingly caused by sexual conquests).

One of the quirks in the novel compared to Galdós’ other works (and Colin Partridge also points this out in his commentary), is that Tristana happens in Madrid’s sprawling suburb to the north—Chamberí. Instead of the usual crowded, bustling urban life in other of his novels Galdós’ isolates these characters outside of mainstream society. While the three main characters each stand in for something larger, the tie feels much looser than in Galdós’ other novels because of this isolation. In this sense I think Galdós achieved precisely what Bazán wanted to see. This is Tristana’s story, and it reflects exactly the same criticisms Bazán had. Does the ending satisfy? No, and that’s precisely the point. The characters don’t live happily ever after despite the ambiguous ending.

Galdós’ message is evasive, not because it is muddled but because his apparent points could be applied to more than his immediate topic. His commentary on the morality of the age shares the wish that people should be free to do as they please, but societal influences/power make people act counter to their interests. Yet all three characters are lacking something and fall back on societal norms, almost with relief and benefit. Tristana’s lot is the worst—she essentially says she is damaged goods, unfit for anything after Don Lope had his way with her. Yet she can never follow through on any attempt at independence, even with others trying to help her accomplish it. It’s a wonderful little novel because Galdós avoids an easy answer, not catering to ideological resolutions that would have felt false while still providing plenty of social commentary along the way. Very highly recommended.

Upcoming: Tristana by Benito Pérez Galdós (and watch the movie now!)

I reviewed Tristana by Benito Pérez Galdós about two years ago. The version of the booked I posted on was Tristana: Buñuel’s Film and Galdós’ Novel: A Case Study in the Relation Between Literature and Film by Colin Partridge (New York: The Edwin Mellen Press, 1995). My summary post links to the following posts related to the novel:
Far from the desired feminist manifesto
Don Lepe
Tristana
Horacio
A Fortunata and Jacinta quote that fits in nicely with Tristana

I'll be posting on the recent NYRB edition, translated by Margaret Jull Costa. The main reason of this post, though is to mention that Luis Buñuel's 1970 movie adapted from the novel is available for instant viewing until February 1, 2015. My notes on the movie adaptation can be found here. You've been notified—watch it early and often. While making some major changes from the novel, the movie is exceptional. As I've mentioned several times, Buñuel and Galdós make a perfect pairing.

Upcoming Galdós translation: Tristana

Yeah!!!

Thanks to Mookse for the heads up on the upcoming Margaret Jull Costa translation of Galdós' Tristana (see his picture for more details). I have several posts on the novel and one on the movie…see the summary post for a starting point. It's a troubling novel, full of the usual ambiguity and irony of Galdós. I'm really looking forward to the new translation!

Tristana by Benito Pérez Galdós

Tristana: Buñuel’s Film and Galdós’ Novel: A Case Study in the Relation Between Literature and Film by Colin Partridge (New York: The Edwin Mellen Press, 1995)

OK, finally wrapping up Tristana…

Colin Partridge has provided a valuable service for anyone interested in an English translation of Galdós’ novel. Tristana is a wonderful book full of Galdosian ambiguity and irony. Its original reception, though was underwhelming. From Partridge’s essay on the novel:

Tristana reflects therefore reflects a moral and social dilemma: the novel points in one direction to explorative personal ambitions and in another to the traditional attitudes and behaviors structuring Spanish society. Its ambivalences probably contributed to its neglect. The author himself appeared to dismiss the work; and there is evidence from the manuscript that his creative imagination was being drawn away from the text in the latter stages of its composition towards the dramatization of Realidad [an earlier Galdós novel that he was adapting for the stage]; he used the manuscript of Tristana to make notes for Realidad which was to be staged in Madrid in March 1892, less than two months after the publication of Tristana. However, the novel gained a level of popular appeal in the deades following Galdós’ death in 1920, but attracted little critical attention.

The novel follows the trials and tribulations of the youthful, orphaned Tristana and the two lovers in her life. The first lover is her guardian, Don Lepe, an aging Don Juan who couldn’t resist one last conquest. The second lover is Horacio, a painter with a similar background as Tristana. The ever-changing dynamics provide the ambiguities and ironies that take it well beyond a simple statement on feminism in the late 1800s Spain. As Partridge describes it (and I’m only slightly paraphrasing him), the novel is a somber comedy, an oral narration offering a wry commentary on human efforts to establish humane relationships, and a problem play questioning gender-based social values.

Something that struck me as I read the novel, and Partridge notes as well, is that each of these three characters is a rebel, or at least claims to be, of one sort or another. Don Lope holds himself outside of social institutions, whether of man or God, although he changes his attitude in old age and poverty. Tristana asserts her right to education despite her inability to focus on any one art for an extended period. She tires of these explorations after the amputation of her leg and, similar to Don Lope, the promise of security. Horacio’s bohemian lifestyle falls by the wayside as he discovers the pleasures of a rustic lifestyle and realizes his desire for marriage (and, presumed, fatherhood). Everyone falls in line with the existing power structure, but Tristana is the only one that doesn’t have an option without sinking into further dissipation. Her choices are restricted, although one of the ‘acceptable’ options—actress—she expresses an interest in and demonstrates an aptitude for, then abandons.

The initial evaluations of Tristana as highlighted in this post reflect the struggles by and disappointments in Galdós. He had been working for social improvements through his writings but little or nothing was being done. He wrote a disturbing tale that ends in disappointment for the reader even though the characters seem happy, making the novel more effective. Highly recommended. The book benefits from the two essays by Partridge, one on the novel, one on Buñuel's movie.

Posts on the novel:
Far from the desired feminist manifesto
Don Lepe
Tristana
Horacio
A Fortunata and Jacinta quote that fits in nicely with Tristana

Notes on the 1970 movie directed by Luis Buñuel

Update (4 March 2015): Notes on the recent NYRB edition, translated by Margaret Jull Costa

Tristana: 1970 movie (Spain)

Tristana (1970) directed by Luis Buñuel
IMDb.com page for the movie

Fernando Rey: Don Lope
Catherine Deneuve: Tristana
Franco Nero: Horacio
Lola Gaos: Saturna
Jesús Fernández: Saturno

Tristana was one of the few movies adapted from a novel that I watched before reading the book. After reading the novel I’m more impressed with what Buñuel accomplished, keeping the general outline of the narrative while making rather dramatic changes to add power to the story. As usual, I will focus mostly on comparing the movie and the novel. The general outline of the two are roughly the same: Tristana’s mother dies and leaves Tristana as ward to the libertine Don Lepe. The old lecher has a perverse sense of chivalry that has become anachronistic. Unable to resist Tristana’s beauty Don Lepe adds her to his list of sexual conquests. Tristana meets and falls in love with the painter Horacio, but a tumor causes the amputation of one of her legs. Horacio effectively marginalizes himself and Tristana marries Don Lepe.

One of the biggest changes to the story is the setting. Galdós’ novel is set indefinitely in the late 1800s in a suburb of Madrid. Buñuel moves the timeframe to the late 1920s/early 1930s in Toledo. The tight, winding streets of Toledo provide a different feel than the spaciousness of the novel. Underscoring one of Galdós’ points, though, is how little has changed in the intervening 50 years. Another major change is the expansion in roles for Saturna, the housekeeper, and Saturno, her son. Saturno is barely mentioned in the novel but is given a significant role almost completely created from nothing. Buñuel makes Saturno a deaf-mute, set apart from society in a mirroring of Tristana’s exclusion as a dependant woman and foreshadowing her debility. Only when he become a house servant does he seem to find a place in society. Saturno’s inconsequential sexual pranks on Tristana appear as a weakened predatory version of Don Lepe. Saturna proves to be a more complicated character in the movie. In the novel she follows along with Don Lepe’s dictatorial rule of the household, weakly standing up to him once. In the movie Saturna provides much the same function in the house but takes a more active role in defying Don Lepe when helping Tristana see Horacio.

There are many other changes that add to the story even though the movie follows the same framework. In the novel Horacio leaves Madrid to take care of his ailing aunt. The movie has Horacio and Tristana leaving Toledo together for two years. Tristana’s tumor is the cause for them returning. In bringing Tristana back to Don Lope as she requested, Horacio earns her scorn and loses her. Horacio fails her sh&t test: “If you loved me you wouldn’t have brought me to this house. Don Lope would never have brought me to another man’s house.” Prior to leaving Toledo, Don Lope had slapped Horacio in the face with his gloves, following his anachronistic respect for the duel. In reply Horacio punches Don Lope in the face, his high-water mark for manliness. Horacio diminishes on the screen after their return and quietly disappears. There’s no mention of him marrying, as in the novel, nor is there need to—his betrayal was bringing Tristana back to Don Lope.

In the novel Don Lope’s relatives bribe him to marry Tristana, promising much needed money after their relationship is legitimate. The two marry and settle down, approaching something that looks like happiness together. In the movie, though, Don Lope inherits money while Horacio and Tristana are away, allowing him to reacquire everything he had sold or pawned for funds. The difference between the two is marked—in the movie Don Lope and Tristana do not have to marry in order to acquire the much needed funds, making Tristana’s agreement to marry Don Lope that much more ambiguous. But then her development is not based on the arts as much in the movie, focusing instead on her emerging sexuality and her desire for control and vengeance. From Colin Partridge’s essay on the film in Tristana: Buñuel’s Film and Galdós’ Novel: A Case Study in the Relation Between Literature and Film (New York: The Edwin Mellen Press, 1995):

In Catherine Deneuve’s portrayal Tristana adapts from the pleasing charm of a schoolgirl with plaits to the anguished determination of a woman marred by a sense of injustice. In the novel Don Lope was the supreme manipulator; in the film, as he loses control over events, Tristana’s grasp inexorably tightens. In the six years of the film’s action she grows to maturity until, finally, only she has the strength and insight to exercise power over the household and over the local elite society which Don Lope’s improved finances have opened to her. In the process of her development, she becomes an incarnation of female power holding together impossible contradictions born of psychological bitterness rather than physical disability. Buñuel’s subtle direction draws Tristana from background to foreground in scene after scene until, in the closing scenes of the last sequence, she dominates the screen—clumping on her crutches along the corridor of the country house, and finally moving as rapidly as her condition allows from Don Lope’s bed to a telephone and then back to open the bedroom windows.

Buñuel adds accents to Don Lope’s aging and descent into dotage. Similar to Álvaro Mesía in La Regenta, it’s implied that sex with the younger woman speeds his decline. After sexual relations end between Don Lope and Tristana, though, he inherits money and it reinvigorates him. The improvement is temporary and the view of the self-proclaimed heretic nattering with priests emphasizes how much he has changed. The movie adds the death of Don Lope with Tristana making one last important choice—whether or not to call the doctor. While the death is one of the final scenes in the movie, it underscores Tristana’s control of the situation. She tells Saturna early in the movie about her ability to discriminate between two choices and as the movie progresses her decisions exert more authority and influence.

An exceptional movie, both in the writing and in the acting. The ambiguity and irony in Galdós is a perfect fit for Buñuel’s style.

(Update: 21 Feb 2014): I just found this essay by Jeremy of the Readin blog. While mostly about Buñuel's career and accomplishments, there is a sizable portion on Tristana.

Tristana by Benito Pérez Galdós: Bonus Fortunata and Jacinta quote and comments

Tristana: Buñuel’s Film and Galdós’ Novel: A Case Study in the Relation Between Literature and Film by Colin Partridge (New York: The Edwin Mellen Press, 1995)

In reading though Colin Partridge’s essay on the novel Tristana I found a quote from Fortunata and Jacinta that I had marked as important when I read it but somehow excluded it in the many posts on that novel. I'm fixing that now. Lucky you. But it’s an important insight into the philosophy in Galdós’novels, contained in what looks like a throwaway line or one easy to miss in a massive novel. From near the end of Volume Three / Chapter 5 (Another Restoration), pages 543-544 in my version with translation by Agnes Moncy Gullón:

Forunata saw Sr. Feijóo very infrequently now; he came to pay ceremonious visits and stayed for about an hour, talking more with Señora Járegui than with Señora Rubín. The pleasant old man appeared to be happy, but his health was failing; by April he never left home without a servant. On one of his visits he was alone with his friend [Fortunata] and spoke to her in such a fatherly way that she almost burst into tears. Everything was going quite well and he presumed that “his chulita” had had time to appreciate his lessons and advice. Feijóo’s friendship displeased Maxi, although he couldn’t have said exactly why. But the strangest part was that after a month or so of this new life, even Fortunata began to enjoy Don Evaristo’s visits less. She continued to feel the same gratitude and affection for him, but she couldn’t help considering the presence of her former protector in that house a monstrosity. “Could it really be,” she wondered, “like what he said—that life is full of these unbelievable horrors! Just think—this is what it’s like! There’s the world you see and then there’s another one, hidden underneath…and the inside is making the outside the way it is. Well, I guess it makes sense after all, it’s not the face of the clock that runs, but what’s inside—what you can’t see.” [emphasis mine]

As Partridge puts it in his essay about Galdós’ writing, “At least two forces are always in conflict, shaping individual consciousness and making each person a part of the world he or she perceives.” There’s nothing earth-shattering in Galdós’ approach but he’s consistent in its application, which makes for plenty of fun reading.

Tristana by Benito Pérez Galdós: Horacio Díaz, the disappointment

Tristana: Buñuel’s Film and Galdós’ Novel: A Case Study in the Relation Between Literature and Film by Colin Partridge (New York: The Edwin Mellen Press, 1995)

In a novel full of ambiguity, Tristana’s lover Horacio is the one certainty. He’s a disappointment.

I should expand on that judgment and qualify it where appropriate. Horacio’s early years resemble Tristana’s background. Orphaned in his youth he became confined by his grandfather. Then Horacio’s story diverges from Tristana’s experience—his grandfather dies and he achieves financial security, allowing him to pursue his love of painting. Horacio playacts at a bohemian life. An early clue that Horatio doesn’t measure up as an artist comes from the distraction Tristana provides. He may call her his muse but he is so preoccupied with her that he abandons his work. The turning point in his relationship with Tristana is not when he leaves to take care of his aunt but in their discussion about children. Tristana turns out to be the real non-conformist of the pair. When taking care of his aunt he finds he enjoys the rustic lifestyle. And as Colin Partridge puts it in his essay on the novel:

His absorption into southern country life dramatizes the collapse of the delicate balance between artist and bohemian that he had maintained in the Madrid suburb. Although first presented as an urban dweller he is, as his name infers, one who prefers rustic pleasures to urban stresses. But unlike his Roman namesake he withdraws to the countryside without having first fulfilled himself as a celebrated artist in the capital.

In addition to Tristana being a problem drama, Galdós indicts a passive artistic community for posing instead of helping revitalize a backward, moribund society. Horacio betrays Tristana’s hopes as much as Don Lope does. Some of that betrayal comes from her immaturity—as Tristana develops she begins to see Horacio’s thoughts as coarse and common. As for her hopes to have an equal partner in her rebelliousness, Horacio falls short.

I’d like to include a few quotes from the novel that highlight the differences between what Horacio had been looking for and what he found in Tristana. The first quote shows that Horacio may talk about the “thorny problem of the liberated woman” but isn’t ready for a solution:

These artistic sentiments, these fanciful flights of a superior feminine intelligence, delighted the young fellow; and not long after they started having intimate relations, he began to see the infatuated young woman growing visibly before his eyes, while he seemed to diminish in importance. This really surprised him; and he found himself on the verge of opposing her, because he had imagined he’d found in Tristana a woman who was of lesser intelligence and weaker willpower, a wife who would live on her husband’s moral and intellectual life and feel with his eyes and his heart. But in reality this young woman was taking her own course, throwing herself into the free spaces of thought and revealing the most remarkable aspirations.

The last quote shows his distraction from painting caused by his love for Tristana, but also focuses on the conventional role he wishes she would play:

It must be admitted that the bouts of amorous excesses our artist of the ideal experienced at those times distracted him from his noble profession. He painted little and always without a model; he began to feel the remorse of the conscientious worker, the anguish before unfinished pictures waiting for form and structure; but between art and love he preferred the latter. It was new and aroused the most delightful sensations; it was a recently-discovered, fertile, exuberant, extremely rich world he could take possession of by advancing resolutely and planting his foot as explorer and conquistador. Art would wait for the time being; he would come back to it when his burning desires had calmed down; then love would appear more peaceful, akin to quiet colonization rather than frantic conquest. This good fellow sincerely believed that Tristana was the love of his life, that no other woman could attract him or ever replace the delight-provoking, generous Tristana. He liked to imagine that time would soothe her fever for ideas; such a flow of penetrating thoughts seemed to him excessive in a wife or long-term mistress. He hoped that his continuing affection and the passing of time would eventually restrain his adored one’s imaginative and rational outbursts, making her more of a woman—more domestic, more conventional and more typical of the present-day.

Tristana by Benito Pérez Galdós: Tristana

Tristana: Buñuel’s Film and Galdós’ Novel: A Case Study in the Relation Between Literature and Film by Colin Partridge (New York: The Edwin Mellen Press, 1995). All quotes are from Partridge’s translation of the text unless otherwise noted.

I'm realizing how poorly thought out my approach was on writing about Tristana, but I’m halfway through it…so I’m continuing with that plan. I’m hoping once I’ve finished all the posts is that it will make a decent whole. We’ll see…

A summary of the story can be found in the post on Don Lope, Tristana’s guardian. This post continues looking at the characters in Benito Pérez Galdós’ Tristana and also tries to make a natural continuation to the previous post on the novel promoting women's rights even though it wasn't the desired manifesto desired by some.

I’ll start with a paragraph from the essays by Colin Partridge since it sums up Tristana’s situation and role in the novel, raising the point that there are similarities with other characters in Galdós' works:

Although Tristana is the center of events she is never allowed to have a dominant influence over other characters. Circumstances shape her; she has little power to shape circumstances. These limitations symbolize a woman who, in the social reality of her time, possessed domestic power within a patriarchal household but was allowed no initiative outside the home or in any action dedicated solely to self-fulfillment. Tristana is comparable to other Galdosian figures dreaming of a life outside present constraints but unable to reach that life or achieve a stable balance between the actual and its alternatives. The psychological condition provoked by this frustration is the focus of Galdós’ presentation of Tristana.

Galdós often uses names to highlight a point or provide irony and Tristana is no exception. Triste mean gloom or sadness, the station in life she is consigned to after her parents die and she becomes Don Lope’s ward…and victim. “Tristana went to live with Don Lope and…(one must say this, although it sounds cruel and painful), within two months of taking her under his care, her name was added to his already extensive list of victories over female innocence.” [ellipsis in original] The name also alludes to the mythical Tristan and his doomed love affair with Iseult/Isolde, providing a foreshadowing of Tristana’s failed relationship with Horacio.

Some notes on Tristana’s relationship with Don Lope:

• His perverted chivalric code colors his view of his relationship with Tristana. He believes he is protecting her, keeping her from danger from other men. 
• She initially doesn’t notice the difference in their ages because of her innocence and his skill.” Her inadequate schooling seriously weakened her; and all sorts of devious manipulations, in which this foxy Don Lope was a past master, kept her confused and at a loss; he was compensating for what years had taken from him by subtle tricks with words and tender gestures—all remarkably effective.” 
• His wiles are tested as Tristana becomes disillusioned in the household and her own sexuality awakens when she meets the painter Horacio. When describing Don Lope to Horacio, Tristana proves to be extremely perceptive about the contradictions in him:

  “No; he’s a bit of everything: he’s an amazing combination of good qualities and horrible deficiencies. He has two consciences: one very pure and noble for certain things, and another like a swamp. He uses each depending on the situation. He can put them on and take them off like shirts. He uses his black and filthy conscience for anything pertaining to love. … In his youth he cut a dashing figure and until very recently he’s kept up the illusion of being dangerous. You realize that his conquests have diminished in importance as the years have added up. I was the last ticket he drew out from the lottery. I belong to his declining years.”

• As Tristana's abhorrence for Don Lope grows, he cajoles and threatens her, essentially driving her into Horacio’s arms and, eventually, Horacio’s bed. 
• One of the funniest ironies in the novel is that Tristana takes on some of Don Lepe’s beliefs, especially his avoidance of marriage. 

With Horacio, Tristana becomes both his muse and, ironically, his distraction (more on that in the post on Horacio). The lovers develop a language based on Dante with Tristana in the role of Beatrice. The irony compounds because of her relationship with Don Lope. Similar to Dante, Tristana elevates Horacio to a role akin to a deity, something the painter could never live up to. This elevation would have occurred, to some extent, while Tristana is under Don Lope’s rule, but it becomes more important when the lovers are apart—absence made the veneration easier. Although Tristana lays out her beliefs and desires several times, here is a succinct summary of a significant part of them in one of her letters to Horacio:

“The more I think about the problem of my life the more it overwhelms me. I want to be somebody in the world, to cultivate an art, to live on my own resources. But discouragement floods over me. Is it true, dear God, that I want the impossible? I want to have a profession and yet I have no training, I don’t know how to do anything. It’s a terrible situation.

“I don’t want to be dependent on anyone, not even on the man I adore. I don’t want to be kept by him—a disgraced being—a female orifice kept by several men because they get pleasure from it, as they would from a hunting dog; and I don’t even want the man of my dreams to become my husband. I see no happiness in marriage. I yearn to express myself in my own way, to be married to myself, and to be the head of my own family. I don’t know how to love from duty; only in total freedom can I show my lifelong fidelity and my daily loyalty.”

The arts appeal to Tristana—painting, books, acting, teaching, music—and she seems to be a suitable student. Except for learning the piano, though, she fails to apply herself for an extended period of time. Combined with her floundering comes her disillusionment with Horacio, which was bound to happen given her deification of him—there is no way he could live up to her vision of him (even before his changes) :

This was not the man who, having been blotted from her memory by distance, her creative imagination had laboriously reconstructed. Now he seemed a rather coarse, ordinary individual, with a face that lacked any appearance of intelligence… .

With all the powers aligned against Tristana and her own weaknesses, it’s no wonder she gives in to the powers controlling or influencing her. She declares, when trying to walk on crutches, “I can only resign myself to the inevitable!” It seems to encompass her resignation beyond her physical limitations. One last quote from Partridge, whose essay provides great summaries on the characters:

As a character Tristana evokes pathos as a continually violated victim; although she never physically escapes from the manipulations of her elderly guardian, youthful lover, pretentious teacher and defeatist environment, mentally and spiritually she creates other realities to turn to; sadly her journeys into an ever-deepening loneliness to become one of the most forlorn and isolated females in the history of the novel. … Although Galdós was always sympathetic to women suffering from social constraints…he did not make Tristana a vessel of emergent feminine consciousness. Tristana was too inexperienced, too naïve, too idealistic; and the forces opposing her were too many and too pervasive.

It’s a powerful novel, speaking more to disappointment in a society that isn’t more open in offering educational/social possibilities for a woman wishing to develop and contribute.

Tristana by Benito Pérez Galdós: far from the desired feminist manifesto

Tristana: Buñuel’s Film and Galdós' Novel: A Case Study in the Relation Between Literature and Film by Colin Partridge (New York: The Edwin Mellen Press, 1995)

I had originally planned to have several posts on the main characters of Tristana and then talk about the opposing viewpoints on the novel but I realized that order only makes sense for someone that has read the book. So I’m revising the schedule and posting on two differing opinions and reactions to the novel, relying heavily on Colin Partridge’s essay. A very general summary of the storyline can be found in the post on Don Lope, Tristana’s guardian.

From Partridge’s essay:

When viewed narrowly as a feminist novel, Tristana disappoints—a response clearly articulated when the book first appeared in 1892. The most celebrated expression of dismay came from the prominent novelist and polemicist Emilia Pardo Bazán. Soon after the first copies appeared she pinpointed accurately, from a feminist viewpoint, the novel’s potential—and failure.

Bazán herself was an active advocate of female freedom. She had written a study La muher Espãñola and was soon to provide a prologue to the first Spanish translation of John Stuart Mill’s The Subjection of Women (1892). She and Galdós had been lovers in the years preceding his composition of Tristana and some of his insights into his young heroine’s dreams of libertad honrada derive from this important relationship. Although Galdós had always been critical of the limited roles permitted women at all levels of Spanish society, Pardo Bazán exercised her formidable powers of lucid persuasion to help him see their condition more compassionately and more profoundly. She corresponded regularly with him as the writing progressed and probably held high expectations about the novel’s value to the emergent feminist cause. So her disappointment, when she finally read the published work and learned the outcome of Tristana’s struggles, was personal as well as ideological.

In her review of the book she voices her regrets at the opportunities Galdós lost by failing to present what she thought was the central drama raised by Tristana’s life. This was the young woman’s loneliness and isolation as she lived divided between Don Lope’s restrictions and her personal aspirations. Pardo Bazán considered that Tristana’s awakening to a fuller understanding of her own position and a broader awareness of the position of women generally in Spanish society had given Galdós the opportunity to write a novel of personal and symbolic liberation. She saw the fictional Tristana representing many contemporary women in real life whose only choices were to become wives, nuns, actresses or prostitutes. … Instead of allowing Tristana to gain a degree of freedom through her patient, naïve efforts, he shows his heroine losing personal power as her sufferings increase and her young lover’s attentions diminish; in the final scenes Don Lope’s oblique manipulations are renewed and all three characters are finally absorbed within irrevocable patterns of traditional behavior.

Pardo Bazán’s disappointment is what makes the novel appeal so much to me. Galdós didn’t go for the simple solution. Any transformation by other characters to promote Bazán’s message would have been simplistic and superficial. Instead of an easy fix and happy ending, the characters are human. In addition, the novel’s focus isn’t solely on Tristana. Yes, there’s the focus on her exploitation and her limited outlets for ambition, but other characters evolve and develop in addition to her and she reacts accordingly. Partridge also highlights Galdós’ consideration of the novel’s setting:

He could have chosen to develop the fictional Tristana into a figure of success and shown her, like Theodore Dreiser’s near-contemporary Carrie Meeber, gaining celebrity status as an actress. But [1892] Madrid was no Chicago or New York; conservative Catholic Spain was not the protestant, individualistic United States.

Galdós’ literary faithfulness, avoiding an ideological resolution that would have felt false, still provides a powerful novel highlighting the limitations and restrictions imposed on women in Spain at the time. And, without blaming the victim, Tristana has her own shortcomings that hinder her independence. She repeatedly begins studies in areas where she could support herself, realizes she has an aptitude in the area and pursues improvement in it…then tosses it aside for some other subject to pursue. Like many other topics in the novel, Galdós doesn’t clarify this, leaving an ambiguity as to its cause—is this a personal failing or is she shaped by her limited role in society? I find myself closer to agreement with the second viewpoint Partridge presents, that of the critic Clarín (Leopoldo Alas), who

saw Tristata as representing another type of female experience. She is the woman conemned to immaturity by forces larger and more powerful than she could ever hope to confront successfully. Hers becomes a “gray destiny” as she grows to realize the constrictions placed on her by an inadequate education, Don Lope’s domestic arrangements and the absence of opportunities for a woman to make an honest and respectable career. Tristana is:

…“a spirit like many others in our mediocre world which are full of ideals and energy, but lack an ongoing clear purpose.”

In this interpretation Tristana is seen as a psychological contradiction—a static being who, at the same time, bubbles with repressed energies. Her only freedom is to imagine; but her fantasizing perpetuates her immaturity. In Clarín’s reading she embodies not the rebellious young woman who dreams of carrying new values to social reality but the many Spanish women doomed to life-long non-fulfilment beneath structures of man-made social conventions. She is more like Clarín’s own heroine Ana Ozores, in La Regenta (1884-1885), seeking self-knowledge in traditional Catholic Spain than like Nora Helmer seeking self-liberation in Ibsen’s Lutheran Norway.

So, soon after its publication in 1892, Emilia Pardo Bazán and Clarín established opposing viewpoints on Tristana which exist to the present-day.

The comparison to Ana Ozores is appropriate since that is exactly what I thought of while reading the novel. It’s not an exact similarity but there are many features that overlap, whether through looking at constraints limiting women or at the individual’s limitations. And again, there's the ambiguity as to her 'immaturity,' as Clarín puts it.

OK, the next posts will look at the two remaining main characters: Tristana and her lover, Horacio.

Tristana by Benito Pérez Galdós: Don Lepe

Happy new year! I’m looking forward to starting 2013 with yet another wonderful novel by Galdós.

Tristana: Buñuel’s Film and Galdós' Novel: A Case Study in the Relation Between Literature and Film by Colin Partridge (New York: The Edwin Mellen Press, 1995)
I was able to obtain this book through an interlibrary loan—good copies are hard to find under $150. Colin Partridge provides a translation of the novel along with essays on the novel and Buñel’s movie. The focus of this post will be on one of the main characters of the novel but first a very quick synopsis of the novel. Don Lope, an aging lecher, becomes Tristana’s guardian after the death of her parents. He becomes her lover, awakening a sense of independence and rebelliousness in the girl. She falls in love with a painter, Horacio, who leaves Madrid to follow his sick aunt to the coast for the winter. The relationship continues in letters, and in these letters Tristana’s desire for independence drives her burgeoning intellect and curiosity. Tristana notices a pain in her leg which worsens, awakening Don Lope’s sense of responsibility for his ward. The leg worsens and has to be amputated, leaving Tristana a dependent cripple. Her desire for independence and learning decreases until she discovers an aptitude and interest in music. During her convalescence Horacio marries another woman. Don Lope’s finances worsen as he takes care of Tristana, but his relatives agree to bail him out if he will marry his ward. They marry, move to the suburbs, and experience something looking like happiness together.

The joy of the novel lies in the telling as well as the complexity and ambiguity lying behind the telling. Don Juan López Garrido shares the center of the novel with the titular character. There are several literary references in the name, providing an ambiguous literary mix of amorous reputation, noble spirit, and a common surname. He began calling himself Don Lope, “his own invention, which he used like an expensive cosmetic to enhance his personality.” Later in the novel Tristana and the house servant, Saturna, call him Don Lepe. Even the narrator begins calling by that name. From the notes—“The pun in the name-change infers that Don Lope is now the malicious devil of the Christian belief system.”

Even with Don Lope’s physical decline (he’s 57 when the novel begins), his wiles and experience are overwhelming for a ‘captive’ Tristana supposed to be under his care. His outlook carries more than just a little wistfulness at his faded prowess, though:

Now it must be stated at once, to whet the appetite, that Don Lope Garrido had once been a redoubtable strategist in amorous jousts and he prided himself on having assaulted more towers of virtue and overcome more ramparts of honor than he had hairs on his head. Although tired now and in his declining years, he couldn’t reject his lifelong waywardness whenever he met pretty women (and some who were not so pretty), he adopted a strategic stance and, with no malice whatsoever, directed meaningful looks, which now were more paternal than seductive, as if here saying to them: “You’ve been lucky to escape, my dears! You can thank God you weren’t born twenty years earlier. You must protect yourselves against those who can do today what I did formerly; but, if you really want my opinion, I think there’s no one today who can do what I did then. Nowadays, you won’t find young fellows, either self-proclaimed gallants or mature men who know what to do with a beautiful woman.”

Don Lope’s lechery coexists with an extreme sense of honor. He helps his friends regardless of the cost to himself. Tristana falls under his care after her parents’ deaths because he bailed them out, going deeper into poverty for his chivalric code to help friends. His code only overlaps with his lechery when it comes to friends—their wives are off limits. The code becomes quixotic through the extremes he takes it and the irony in its selective application. Don Lope’s code has no basis in social institutions since he doesn’t believe in the laws of man or God. His expertise regarding duels, as a participant and officiator, emphasizes his strong sense of honor on these points. His physical decline becomes mirrored in a moral decline, where chivalry becomes perverted for sexual ends.

Included in Don Lope’s distaste of social institutions is a lifelong distaste for marriage. His sexual conquests occur outside his home. This changes after taking Tristana in as his ward and seducing her. She is the exception to his rules, erasing the lines between his chivalric code and sexual desire and it shows in the mixed messages he feels and sends to her. Is he a father figure or her lover? In trying to have it both ways, alternating between the roles, the ambiguity of his character is highlighted.

Don Lope takes pride in his role of a lover, dismissing the capabilities in the men of Tristana’s generation. Yet his pride awakens an independence and determination in Tristana that effectively drives her into the arms of a lover. The ambiguity between Don Lope’s roles resolves only through Tristana’s illness and the amputation of her leg. His desire for control of her does not lessen, though, and he easily marginalizes the lover. Although it helps that the lover marginalizes himself. After all the twists of fate and changing dynamics, Don Lope and Tristana marry and appear happy. Or at least some version of happy.

In Colin Partridge’s essay on the novel he states “Throughout this grim mannered comedy Don Lope deploys two devices to achieve his strategic objectives: his skill with words and his ease in manipulating social rituals.” I would add a third device to his advantage, or maybe the second one is meant to include it—the vulnerability and lack of independence of women in Spanish society. More on this in the post on Tristana.