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Galdós' Doña Perfecta and Turgenev's Fathers and Sons: Two Interpretations of the Conflict between Generations

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 December 2020

Vernon A. Chamberlin  and
Jack Weiner
Vernon A. Chamberlin
Affiliation:
University of Kansas, Lawrence
Jack Weiner
Affiliation:
University of Kansas, Lawrence
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Abstract

Scholars have long noted the influence of Russian writers, particularly Tolstoy and Dostoevsky, on the novels of Benito Pérez Galdós. However, in an interview granted to the Russian journalist la. Pavlovskii in 1884 (only recently published in the West) Galdós acknowledges an indebtedness to an earlier Russian master, Ivan Turgenev, referring to him as “my great teacher.” A close reading of Turgenev's Fathers and Sons and Galdós' Doña Perfecta suggests that the Russian masterpiece may have inspired the well-known Spanish work. The novels share a common theme (the conflict between generations), and in each the hero is a young man trained in science who makes an extended visit to the provinces. In both works the protagonist dies a tragic, untimely death. There are other important similarities between the two books, but significant differences as well, particularly in the authors' attitudes toward the conflict itself. Galdós believed completely in Pepe Rey's cause, while Turgenev was ambivalent about the forces his hero represented; thus, in tone and structure each novel reflects its author's feelings. There appears to be no doubt that Galdós knew Fathers and Sons and made use of certain of its ideas in creating his own independent and highly personal interpretation of the conflict between generations.

Type
Research Article
Information
PMLA , Volume 86 , Issue 1 , January 1971 , pp. 19 - 24
Copyright
Copyright © Modern Language Association of America, 1971

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References

Note 1 in page 23 See Walter T. Pattison, Benito Perez Galdos and the Creative Process (Minneapolis, Minn., 1954) regarding Gloria and Marianela; Louise S. Blanco, “Origin and History of the Plot of Marianela” Hispania, 47 (1965), 463–67; and Alfred Rodriguez, “Algunos aspectos de la elaboracion literaria de La familia de Leó n Roch,” ? ML A, 82 (1967), 120–27.

Note 2 in page 23 Mikhail Pavlovich Alekseev, “Turgenev i ispanskie pisateli” (“Turgenev and Spanish Writers”), Literaturnyi kritik, 11 (Oct. 1938), 142; which later appeared as “Turgenev y los escritores espanoles,” La literatura internacional, 11 (1943), 54–60.

Note 3 in page 23 H. Chonon Berkowitz, La biblioteca de Benito Perez Galdos (Las Palmas, 1951), p. 199. Alexandre Zviguilsky also reports seeing two letters from Pavlovskii to Galdos, “Tourgueniev et Galdos,” Revue de Littérature Comparée, 41 (1967), 119.

Note 4 in page 23 Alekseev, “Turgenev i ispanskie pisateli.”

Note 5 in page 23 Zviguilsky,“TourguénievetGaldos,”p. 118.Zviguilsky's article first appeared in Turgenevskii sbornik: Materialy k polnomu sobraniyu sochinenii i pisem I. S. Turgeneva (Leningrad, 1966), ii, 321–24.

Note 6 in page 23 See, among others, George Portnoff, La literatura rusa en Espaha (New York, 1932), pp. 125–205; Vera Colin, “A Note on Tolstoy and Galdos,” Anales Galdosianos, 2 (1967), 155–68; and Patricia Crayne de Rincones, “A Comparison of the Mystical Characters of Fyodor Dostoievsky and Benito Perez Galdos,” M.A. thesis Kansas 1958.

Note 7 in page 23 Pp. 123–71.

Note 8 in page 23 Perez Galdos: Spanish Liberal Crusader (Madison, Wis., 1948).

Note 9 in page 23 For the importance of documentation in Galdos' creative process, see Berkowitz, Pérez Guidas, pp. 108–12.

Note 10 in page 24 Obras, ed. F. C. Sainz de Robles, iv (Madrid, 1954), 172.

Note 11 in page 24 Obras, ed. F. C. Sainz de Robles, i (Madrid, 1958), 27778. Subsequent references to Episodios Nacionales are from this edition.

Note 12 in page 24 See Pattison, pp. 6–17.

Note 13 in page 24 Vol. 17, pp. 398–99. This article deals exclusively with Russian neoclassic writers.

Note 14 in page 24 La biblioteca, p. 210.

Note 15 in page 24 Ocherki istorii ispano-russkikh lileraturnykh otnoshenii XVI-XIX vv (Leningrad, 1964), 207–14.

Note 16 in page 24 Alekseev, p. 212, n. 12.

Note 17 in page 24 Alekseev, pp. 210–11.

Note 18 in page 24 See Pattison, pp. 12, 20, 37–38, 52–53, 115–16.

Note 19 in page 24 Both French editions were published in Paris (Vladimir Boutchik, Bibliographie des œuvres littéraires russes traduites en français, Paris, 1934, p. 163); and the English edition was published in New York (British Museum General Catalogue, CCXLII, 352). If Galdos possessed his own personal copy of any of these three early editions of Fathers and Sons, there is no record of the fact. Berkowitz catalogues only a third French edition (Paris, 1880) as being in Galdos' library after his death (La biblioteca, p. 199). However, many of the books Galdos did own at one time have disappeared, “for Galdos was notably easygoing and generous with his personal property” (Pattison, p. 11).

Note 20 in page 24 Especially in Bailén (1873) and Cadiz (1874); see Catherine E. Law, “The Genesis of Dona Perfecta” M.A. thesis Smith Coll. 1939.

Note 21 in page 24 Doha Perfecta, trans. Harriet de Onis (Woodbury, ?. Y., 1960), p. 15. Subsequent references are to this edition. Pepe Rey also sees “old peasants' huts, . . . broken-down irrigation wheels with buckets so leaky they could hardly water half a dozen cabbages, . . . miserable, hopeless desolation” (p. 7).

Note 22 in page 24 Fathers and Sons, trans. Barbara Makanowitzky (New York, 1963), pp. 9–10. Subsequent references are to this edition.

Note 23 in page 24 In Doha Perfecta “Caballuco” shoots Pepe Rey, and in Fathers and Sons Bazarov dies of blood poisoning from one of his own medical instruments. The year following the publication of Fathers and Sons, Turgenev answered his critics, reiterating that he had indeed intended Bazarov's death to be interpreted as tragic. See “Letter to Sluchevsky,” Fathers and Sons, trans. Bernard G. Guerney (New York, 1961), pp. xxxiv-xxxv.

Note 24 in page 24 Turgenev said that he conceived of Bazarov as “a somber, savage, great figure, grown half its height out of the soil, mighty, rancorous, honest, yet still doomed to perdition, since it was still standing on the threshold of the future,” “Letter to Sluchevsky,” p. xxxv. Cf. Ruth Davies, “Bazarov, whom Turgenev himself admitted he did not know whether to love or to hate,” The Great Books of Russia (Norman, Okla., 1968), p. 100.

Note 25 in page 24 Because of Turgenev's objectivity, many readers have had difficulty in deciding which side the author himself favored and with whom he wished them to sympathize. See Turgenev, “Apropos of Fathers and Sons,” Literary Reminiscences and Autobiographical Fragments, trans. David Magarshak (New York, 1958), pp. 194–200; and “Letter to Sluchevsky,” pp. xxxii-xxxv.

Note 26 in page 24 Stephen Gilman, “Las referencias clâsicas de Doha Perfecta: Tema y estructura de la novela,” NRFH, 3 (1949), 353–59; and Rodolfo Cardona, introduction to Doha Perfecta (New York, 1965), p. 20.

Note 27 in page 24 Gilman, pp. 358–59. Cf. Cardona, introduction to Doha Perfecta, p. 20 and p. 262, n. 12.

Note 28 in page 24 See Ruth Davies, The Great Books of Russia, p. 83 ; and Gustavo Correa, “El arquetipo de Orbajosa en ‘Dona Perfecta,‘ ” El simbolismo religioso en las novelas de Pérez Galdos (Madrid, 1962), pp. 38–39.

Note 29 in page 24 See Vernon A. Chamberlin, “Dona Perfecta: Light and Darkness, Good and Evil,” Papers of the Galdos Symposium (Fredricksburg, Va., 22 April 1967), pp. 57–70.

Note 30 in page 24 See Cardona, introduction to Doha Perfecta, pp. 2124; and Gilman, pp. 358–59.

Note 31 in page 24 Pp. 131–32. One reader objected because Turgenev allowed Father Alexis to beat the protagonist in a game of cards. See “Apropos of Fathers and Sons,” p. 196.

Note 32 in page 24 For Galdos' well-known anticlericalism see, among others, Berkowitz, Pérez Galdos, pp. 72–73, 139–41; and Galdos, “La Espaiïa de Hoy,” reprinted in Josette Blan-quat, “Au temps d'Electra (documents galdosiens),” Bulletin Hispanique, 68 (1966), 295–303.

Note 33 in page 24 The prime motivators behind Jacinto's interest in Rosario are, of course, Maria Remedios and Don Inocen-cio. However, by the time Pepe Rey arrives in Orbajosa, Jacinto may be considered a rival suitor (Doha Perfecta, p. 46).

Note 34 in page 24 Ruth Davies, p. 86.

Note 35 in page 24 See Berkowitz, Pérez Galdos, p. 19; Donald F. Brown, “More Light on Galdos' Mother,” Hispania, 39 (1956), 403; and Vernon A. Chamberlin, “Galdos' Use of Yellow in Character Delineation,” PMLA, 79 (1964), 159, 161.

Note 36 in page 24 See Berkowitz, Pérez Galdos, pp. 16–19, 95–97; and Brown, p. 405.

Note 37 in page 24 “Memorias de un desmemoriado” and “Memoranda,” Obras, ed. F. G. Sainz de Robles, vi (Madrid, 1951), 1693, 1426. See also Pattison, p. 7.

Note 38 in page 24 Among the many parallels in the lives of Galdos and Turgenev, one notes that both were cosmopolites and political liberals, with a great love for music. In addition, each had an extremely domineering mother, remained a lifelong bachelor, but had to face the problem of an illegitimate daughter. For more details, see Berkowitz, Pérez Galdos; and Avrahm Yarmolinsky, Turgenev: The Man—His Art—and His Age (New York, 1926).

Note 39 in page 24 Catherine E. Law's unpublished study, “The Genesis of Doha Perfecta,” deals only with the creation of Doha Perfecta vis-à-vis Galdos' earlier novels; and Alexander H. Krappe in “The Sources of B. Pérez Galdos, Doha Perfecta, Cap. vi,”/>Ô,7(1928), 303–06, limits himself to Pepe Rey's fiery speech against religious superstition and Krappe finds therein echoes from Heinrich Heine, Zur Geschichte der Religion und Philosophie in Deutschland; and from Lucretius, De Rerum Natura.