Spanish Women Writers and Spain's Civil War

The Spanish Civil War (1936-1939) pitted conservative forces including the army, the Church, the Falange (fascist party), landowners, and industrial capitalists against the Republic, installed in 1931 and supported by intellectuals, the petite bourgeoisie, many campesinos (farm laborers), and the urban proletariat. Provoking heated passions on both sides, the Civil War soon became an international phenomenon that inspired a number of literary works reflecting the impact of the war on foreign and national writers. While the literature of the period has been the subject of scholarship, women's literary production has not been studied as a body of work in the same way that literature by men has been, and its unique features have not been examined. Addressing this lacuna in literary studies, this volume provides fresh perspectives on well-known women writers, as well as less studied ones, whose works take the Spanish Civil War as a theme. The authors represented in this collection reflect a wide range of political positions. Writers such as Maria Zambrano, Mercè Rodoreda, and Josefina Aldecoa were clearly aligned with the Republic, whereas others, including Mercedes Salisachs and Liberata Masoliver, sympathized with the Nationalists. Most, however, are situated in a more ambiguous political space, although the ethics and character portraits that emerge in their works might suggest Republican sympathies. Taken together, the essays are an important contribution to scholarship on literature inspired by this pivotal point in Spanish history.

Maryellen Bieder is Professor Emerita in the Department of Spanish and Portuguese at Indiana University. Roberta Johnson is Profeesor Emerita at the University of Kansas and Adjunct Professor in the Department of Spanish and Portuguese at the University of California, Los Angeles.

CONTENTS INTRODUCTION: Spanish Women Writers and Spain's Civil War ROBERTA JOHNSON AND MARYELLEN BIEDER María Zambrano's Enduring Drama: Remembering the Spanish Civil War SHIRLEY MANGINI Living the War, Writing the War: Poetic Figuration in Mercè's La plaça del Diamant MARYELLEN BIEDER Spaces of Enclosure in Liberata Masoliver's Barcelona en llamas LISA NALBONE Hybrid Discourses and Double Voices: Re-evaluating the Spanish Civil War in Mercedes Salisachs's Novels CHRISTINE ARKINSTALL The Last Battle: Gloria Fuertes and the Politics of Emotion in Her Late Civil War Poems REYES VILA-BELDA The Theater of Maria Aurèlia Capmany and the Reverberations of Civil War (History, Censorship, Silence) SHARON G. FELDMAN Carmen Laforet's Inspiration for Nada (1945) ISRAEL ROLÓN-BARADA Carmen Martín Gaite's Concept of Ruins ROBERTA JOHNSON Novels as History Lessons in Ana María Matute's Primera memoria (1960) and Demonios familiares (2014): From Betrayal to Solidarity SILVIA BERMÚDEZ The Phantasm of Civil War in Josefina Aldecoa's Novelistic Trilogy DAVID K. HERZBERGER Impossible Neutrality: Civil War and Melodrama in Marina Mayoral's Novels ROSALÍA CORNEJO PARRIEGO Montserrat Roig and the Civil War: Questions of Genre, Gender, and Authorial Presence CATHERINE G. BELLVER Family Documents, Analogy, and Reconciliation in the Works of Carme Riera KATHRYN EVERLY Dead Woman Walking: "Historical Memory," Trauma, and Adaptation in Dulce Chacón's La voz dormida MICHAEL UGUARTE CONTRIBUTOR BIOGRAPHIES