Drama
Unamuno's dramatic production presents a philosophical progression.
Questions such as individual spirituality, faith as a "vital lie", and the problem of a double personality were at the center of La esfinge (The Sphinx) (1898), and La verdad (Truth), (1899).
In 1934, he wrote El hermano Juan o El mundo es teatro (Brother Juan or The World is a Theatre).
Unamuno's theatre is schematic; he did away with artifice and focused only on the conflicts and passions that affect the characters. This austerity was influenced by classical Greek theatre. What mattered to him was the presentation of the drama going on inside of the characters, because he understood the novel as a way of gaining knowledge about life.
By symbolizing passion and creating a theatre austere both in word and presentation, Unamuno's theatre opened the way for the renaissance of Spanish theatre undertaken by Ramón del Valle-Inclán, Azorín, and Federico García Lorca.
Read more about this topic: Miguel De Unamuno
Famous quotes containing the word drama:
“Our true history is scarcely ever deciphered by others. The chief part of the drama is a monologue, or rather an intimate debate between God, our conscience, and ourselves. Tears, griefs, depressions, disappointments, irritations, good and evil thoughts, decisions, uncertainties, deliberations—all these belong to our secret, and are almost all incommunicable and intransmissible, even when we try to speak of them, and even when we write them down.”
—Henri-Frédéric Amiel (1821–1881)
“A good drama critic is one who perceives what is happening in the theatre of his time. A great drama critic also perceives what is not happening.”
—Kenneth Tynan (1927–1980)
“War is the supreme drama of a completely mechanized society.”
—Lewis Mumford (1895–1990)