The Writer in the Landscape: Authorial Self-Representation and Literary Form in the Landscape Writings of Unamuno and Azorin

The figure of the intellectual emerged in Spain in the second half of the nineteenth century, and Azorin (Jose Martinez Ruiz) and Miguel de Unamuno explored the critical and creative possibilities of this new role in their writings. This comparative study of these authors’ prose writings on landscape focuses on the literary personae of the artist-intellectual that both Azorin and Unamuno cultivated and on their innovative use of the article form. The principal body of the study is dedicated to each author’s extension of the narrative of literary self-creation beyond the boundaries of the novel in the flexible, literary form of the article, Strzeszewski’s reading of these sui generis writings should contribute to a greater appreciation of their innovative character.