A New History of Spanish Writing, 1939 to the 1990s »

Chris Perriam is Professor of Hispanic Studies at the University of Newcastle. Michael Thompson is Lecturer in Spanish at the University of Durham. Susan Frenk is Lecturer in Spanish at the University of Durham. Vanessa Knights is Lecturer in Spanish at the University of Newcastle.

A New History of Spanish Writing, 1939 to the 1990s explores the diversity of some sixty years of imaginative writing by Spaniards, its interactions with Spain's peculiarly dramatic history since the end of its Civil War, and its wider thematic significance. It covers the famous and canonical texts of the most recent in Modern Spanish literature but also explores areas less well-known outside Spain (essays and editorials, queer narrative, new poetry, comics, and texts of the militant and reactionary Right). More space than is usual in literary histories is allowed for commentary on famous texts, but the book also makes room for the marginalized and for socially contextualized explorations of the interconnectedness of various forms of writing. The overall structure is not chronological but thematic, dealing with abstract and topical issues such as silence, the family, or realism.

Times Literary Supplement - Peter Evans

This book provides a welcome opportunity for taking stock both of the explosion of writing since democracy and of the wealth and variety of material that has sometimes been overlooked in lofty dismissals of pre-democratic Spain as as arid wilderness of ideologized culture...The focus on popular writing is particularly gratifying, as it brings to the fore a whole sweries of texts and traditions often overlooked by canon-seekers, inside and outside the Academy.