Product Description

Galdos' four-part "Fortunata and Jacinta" (1886-7), the masterpiece among his almost 80 novels, tells the turbulent story of two women, their husbands and their lovers, set against the intricate web of dynastic alliances and class contrasts of Madrid in the 1870s.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #272911 in Books
• Published on: 1989-03-07
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 848 pages

From Publishers Weekly
This new translation of Spanish novelist Perez Galdos's 19th century tale depicting society during the Alfonsine restoration of 1875, a masterpiece patterned on Balzac and Dickens, provides a read that is startlingly fresh and immediate. Fortunata, a glorious woman of the people, struggles all her life against the angelic, bourgeois Jacinta; both adore Jacinta's charming, selfish husband, the sybarite Juanito. Perez Galdos (18431920) steeps his story in scenes of working- and middle-class Madrid that are panoramic and intimate: the streets and reeking tenements, shops and stalls that open like mouths, the fashion trades, cafes where idlers thrash out politics, the pharmacy where Fortunata's sickly husband Maxi goes mad with jealousy, the convent in which the passionate Fortunata is locked to repent her promiscuity, the twin beds where Juanito caresses Jacinta with lies. Gentle Jacinta buying a baby she thinks is Fortunata's is just one of the novel's shrewd, unforgettable characterizations that reveal the commercial nexus and often animal thirst for power infecting the populous Perez Galdos world. A vast, savory novel in the great tradition, this is not to be missed.
Copyright 1987 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal
This masterpiece of Spain's greatest novelist after Cervantes, appearing on the centennial of its composition, complements the same publisher's issue of another overlooked classic, Alas's La Regenta ( LJ 3/1/84). The sprawling plot and polyphonic structure resist easy summary but essentially focus on the interrelationships of two married couplesthe refined but barren Jacinta and her pampered, philandering husband, whose mistress, the lowborn but fertile Fortunata, is wed to a sickly schizophrenicinto whose lives swarms a hive of secondary characters from all walks of 19th-century Madrid life. Gullon's translation is much more readable, contemporary, and accurate than Lester Clark's partial translation (Penguin, 1973). An essential acquisition. Lawrence Olszewski, P.L. of Columbus & Franklin Cty., Ohio
Copyright 1986 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Language Notes
Text: English, Spanish (translation)

Customer Reviews

Que Novela Magnifica
Having read this novel both in Spanish and in translation, I can truly say that it's a masterpiece. The characters are realistically drawn, the plot is engaging, and most inportantly, we can see the inner feelings and motivations behind the main characters' actions. This book can be analyzed on so many levels: psychological, historical, from a feminist perspective...it's a gold-mine for Galdos scholars. But it shouldn't be limited to Spanish literature scholars; English majors should read it in their world lit classes to compare with Dickens.

Humane and observant fictional window on 19th Century Spain
An unexpected delight, author Perez Galdos is the Iberian Dickens, with dozens of full length novels, many in an intricate historical series. Fortunata y Jacinta is perhaps his best known work, a sharply drawn social portrait of mid-Victorian era Madrid. The lower class and the bourgeoisie are each represented by one female protagonist, with penetrating looks at the clergy, government, and business establishments as backdrops

An overlooked masterpiece
Until I picked up a copy of Fortunata and Jacinta on a whim from a bookseller in Burgos, I had never heard of Benito Pérez Galdós: Why this novel isn't better-known in America is completely beyond me. Pérez Galdós is sometimes compared to Dickens, but the comparison is misleading: for delicious ambiguity, unsettlingly realistic psychology, and unforgettable, sympathetic characters far more engaging than vulgar, oversimplified Dickensian puppets, Pérez Galdós is far superior. The narrative sparkles with humor and wit while never compromising the tragic beauties that make the book so powerful. It's no exaggeration to say that this book should be required reading for anyone interested in culture - a classic not only of Spanish, but of Western Literature.