A Timely Taste of Spain

 

Miguel de Unamuno y Jugo

Miguel de Unamuno y Jugo (1864 – 1936) was a Spanish essayist, novelist, poet, playwright, philosopher, professor of Greek, and later rector at the University of Salamanca. He was prolific in many genres, including poetry, essays, and drama, but he is best remembered for his philosophical treatise The Tragic Sense of Life (1912). 

His novels include Paz en la guerra (Peace in War) (1897), Niebla (Mist) (1914), Vida de Don Quijote y Sancho (1914), and Abel Sánchez (1917).

If you would like to become familiar with some of Unamuno's thought, I recommend the book Essays, Paradoxes, Soliloquies.

Unamuno's works often are poetic, and they ring with sincere apologies for the tragic sense of life. Yet they retain hope, even as Quijote's hope for triumph over his foes never left him. Quijote's dying words to Sancho Panza were "Bring me my sword."

Because Unamuno's thought leaves wiggle room to explore, his readers may freely wander unexplored paths and discover unfamiliar literary places. We are allowed to live with uncomfortable contradictions. This space is shrinking in our polarized world. Our time is not unlike the eve of the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939). All the more reason to become familiar with the thought of Miguel de Unamuno!

In October 1936 Unamuno denounced General Francisco Franco’s Falangists. This resulted in his removal as rector of Salamanca University. He was placed under house arrest, and he died of a heart attack two months later.

Related reading: Love the Work of Miguel de Unamuno y Jugo

Miguel de Unamuno's Prayer of the Atheist

The existential angst of Miguel de Unamuno (1864-1936) is evident in his novels, essays and poems. Along with Søren Kierkegaard, he is regarded as a Christian Existentialist, something he would probably find ironic! Unamuno learned Danish in order to read Kierkegaard’s work in the original language. In addition to Danish and his native Basque, he mastered 12 other languages.

A central metaphysical problem for existentialists involves alienation from self. Because others exist in the world I can take a third-person perspective on myself. This reveals the extent to which I am alienated from my being, because an objective sense of who I am can be revealed only by the Other. This is the problem with which Miguel de Unamuno struggles in the following poem.

La oración del ateoMiguel de Unamuno y Jugo

Oye mi ruego Tú, Dios que no existes,
y en tu nada recoje estas mis quejas,
Tú que a los pobres hombres nunca dejas
sin consuelo de engaño. No resistes

a nuestro ruego y nuestro anhelo vistes.
Cuando Tú de mi mente más te alejas,
más recuerdo las plácidas consejos,
con que mi ama endulzóme noches tristes.

¡Qué grande eres, mi Dios! Eres tan grande
que no eres sino Idea; es muy angosta
la realidad por mucho que se espande

para abarcarte. Sufro yo a tu costa,
Dios no existente, pues si Tú existieras
existiría yo también de veras


Prayer of the Atheist

Miguel de Unamuno y Jugo

Hear my supplication Thou, non-existent God,
and in thy nothingness gather these my complaints,
Thou who never leavest poor men
without consolation of deceit. Thou resisteth not

our plea and our yearning thou seest.
When Thou from my mind withdraweth,
I remember again the pleasant tales
with which my nursemaid sweetened my sad nights.

How great Thou art, my God! Thou art so great
that Thou art nothing more than an Idea, it is a narrow
reality the more it expands

to embrace Thee. I suffer on thy account,
non-existent God, since were Thou to exist
I also would truly exist.

(Translation: Alice C. Linsley)