Cuentos de la Galicia antigua

by Emilia Pardo Bazán

En esta selección, preparada por el profesor de la Universidad de Milán Danilo Manera, se encuentran las mejores narraciones breves situadas por Emilia Pardo Bazán en su querida tierra gallega. Aparece así, contado con la riqueza plástica y espontánea de la oralidad popular, un escenario natural mágico y salvaje, un mundo de marineros y campesinos, emigrantes y mendigos, bandidos e indianos, clérigos y caciques, leyendas y supersticiones, violencia y generosidad, pobreza y tesoros escondidos, poblado sobre todo por inolvidables personajes femeninos, con su inocencia y dramaticidad.

220 pages, Paperback

Published January 1, 2001

About the author

Emilia Pardo Bazán was a Galician author and scholar from Galicia. She is known for bringing naturalism to Spanish literature, for her detailed descriptions of reality, and for her role in feminist literature of her era.
Her first novel, Pascual López (1879), is a simple exercise in fantasy of no remarkable promise, though it contains good descriptive passages of romance. It was followed by a more striking story, Un viaje de novios (1881), in which a discreet attempt was made to introduce into Spain the methods of French realism. The book caused a sensation among the literary cliques, and this sensation was increased by the appearance of another naturalistic tale, La tribuna (1885), wherein the influence of Émile Zola is unmistakable. Meanwhile, the writer's reply to her critics was issued under the title of La cuestion palpitante (1883), a clever piece of rhetoric, but of no special value as regards criticism or dialectics.
The best of Emilia Pardo Bazán's work is embodied in Los pazos de Ulloa (1886), the painfully exact history of a decadent aristocratic family. A sequel, with the significant title of La madre naturaleza (1887), marks a further advance in the path of naturalism.
She was also a journalist, essayist and critic. She died in Madrid.