For one reason or another, there are authors who have remained linked almost exclusively to a single work. This is largely the case with Luis Martín-Santos. The writer and psychiatrist is joined most of the time practically alone by ‘Time of Silence’, which appeared in 1962. This decisive novel in the course of Spanish literature in the second half of the last century was an enormous shock at a time when which the novelistic formulas had reached their exhaustion. NOVEL ‘Unpublished novels’ Author Luis Martín-Santos Editorial Galaxia Gutenberg Year 2024 Pages 280 Price 23 euros 4In this story, starring a young researcher in the impoverished Madrid of the late 1940s, we can find numerous levels of reading and a style as brilliant as it is complex, full of resources—perspectivism, interior monologue, use of digression…—, assembled with great skill by its author. But Martín-Santos is much more than ‘Time of Silence’. His premature death in a car accident in Vitoria in 1964 prevented him from continuing with a production called to be one of the best of our lyrics. However, we can now enjoy part of his ‘Complete Works’, thanks to the project launched by Galaxia Gutenberg with the invaluable help of the writer’s children, Luis and Rocío Martín-Santos Laffón, and directed by the professor of Spanish Literature , scholar and literary critic Domingo Ródenas de Moya. Although different, both explore the practice of a power that is not a little tyrannical, and there are complaints, but not only that. The plan includes six volumes, of which three have so far seen the light, along with the publication, separately, of ‘The Rotten Dawn’ – a set of stories in tandem with his friend Juan Benet -, a new edition of ‘Time of Destruction’ , an unfinished novel, which had a first reconstruction in 1975 by José-Carlos Mainer, and ‘Time of Freedom’, a suggestive compilation of documents and photographs. The third volume of the ‘Complete Works’ that now reaches us, coinciding with the anniversary of the hundred years of his birth – November 11, 1924 – is one of the most attractive as it includes two unpublished novels: ‘The Swollen Belly’ and ‘El Saco’, written, respectively, between 1948 and 1950 and 1954-1955, in a volume under the care of Professor Epicteto Díaz Navarro, which offers us a magnificent prologue. The first presents us, in a rural, elementary and primary setting, the triangle formed by the master, the servant and the maid, thus, without a name, called, just as there are hardly any temporal or spatial concretions. The maid has sexual relations with both of them, and, without knowing which one, she becomes pregnant, with which the monotonous daily routine of their lives is strongly disrupted to an open ending. We are facing a novel with certain touches of tremendousness, but with the intention of transcending it. The second, titled with the nickname of the director of a prison, immerses us in a prison drama, with Kafkaesque resonances, intertwining with the story of another main character, López, who is told how he came to become a prison guard. A curious decision by El Saco, interpreted very differently by him and by the inmates, motivates an attack and, as a consequence, the torture of three prisoners, and, in a chain, a riot with unfortunate repercussions. Although different, in both the practice of a power that is not a little tyrannical is explored – and in ‘The Swollen Belly’ the force of patriarchy, with details such as the maid eating standing up -, and there is a vocation to denounce, but not only that. Both, apart from their intrinsic value, are essential to see how Luis Martín-Santos is testing his own worldview and style, which he will shape in ‘Time of Silence’.
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