reading this very long, but powerful novel, I find it inexplicable why Galdós is so little known outside the Spanishspeaking world.
Most in the Englishspeaking world do not know Russian, but we appreciate Tolstoy, Dostoyevsky, and Chekhov, Nor French but love Dumas, Hugo and Flaubert, nor German but know Goethe, Schiller and Hoffmann, But only Cervantes for Spain, What a pity. Galdós paints an incredible portrait of Madrid in a realistic group setting, Though characters abound, each has a part in this saga of love from two distinct classes for one, undeserving man.
Fortunata will remain with me for years, What a pleasure. Qué curioso que el personaje que me ha sacado más de quicio por tonta y por no aprender después de caer cuarenta veces en el mismo error sea el que más me haya gustado y marcado.
Tengo que confesar que el libro no me ha encantado, aprecio el estilo del autor y lo bien que muestra los diferentes aspectos de la sociedad de la época, pero los temas que trata no suelen ser de mi agrado y el drama casi telenovelesco tiende a molestarme más que a gustarme en este caso ha sido un punto intermedio, no me ha encantado pero tampoco lo he sufrido, ha estado bien.
No es lo primero que leo del autor y salí con la misma opinión las otras veces, pero no me rindo y seguiré dando oportunidades a los libros de este autor que se considera uno de los mejores de la literatura española.
"𝑵𝒐 𝒄𝒐𝒏𝒕𝒂𝒎𝒐𝒔 𝒄𝒐𝒏 𝒍𝒂 𝑵𝒂𝒕𝒖𝒓𝒂𝒍𝒆𝒛𝒂,
𝒒𝒖𝒆 𝒆𝒔 𝒍𝒂 𝒈𝒓𝒂𝒏 𝒎𝒂𝒅𝒓𝒆 𝒚 𝒎𝒂𝒆𝒔𝒕𝒓𝒂 𝒒𝒖𝒆 𝒓𝒆𝒄𝒕𝒊𝒇𝒊𝒄𝒂 𝒍𝒐𝒔 𝒆𝒓𝒓𝒐𝒓𝒆𝒔 𝒅𝒆 𝒔𝒖𝒔 𝒉𝒊𝒋𝒐𝒔 𝒆𝒙𝒕𝒓𝒂𝒗𝒊𝒂𝒅𝒐𝒔. 𝑵𝒐𝒔𝒐𝒕𝒓𝒐𝒔 𝒉𝒂𝒄𝒆𝒎𝒐𝒔 𝒎𝒊𝒍 𝒅𝒊𝒔𝒑𝒂𝒓𝒂𝒕𝒆𝒔, 𝒚 𝒍𝒂 𝑵𝒂𝒕𝒖𝒓𝒂𝒍𝒆𝒛𝒂 𝒏𝒐𝒔 𝒍𝒐𝒔 𝒄𝒐𝒓𝒓𝒊𝒈𝒆. 𝑷𝒓𝒐𝒕𝒆𝒔𝒕𝒂𝒎𝒐𝒔 𝒄𝒐𝒏𝒕𝒓𝒂 𝒔𝒖𝒔 𝒍𝒆𝒄𝒄𝒊𝒐𝒏𝒆𝒔 𝒂𝒅𝒎𝒊𝒓𝒂𝒃𝒍𝒆𝒔 𝒒𝒖𝒆 𝒏𝒐 𝒆𝒏𝒕𝒆𝒏𝒅𝒆𝒎𝒐𝒔, 𝒚 𝒄𝒖𝒂𝒏𝒅𝒐 𝒒𝒖𝒆𝒓𝒆𝒎𝒐𝒔 𝒒𝒖𝒆 𝒏𝒐𝒔 𝒐𝒃𝒆𝒅𝒆𝒛𝒄𝒂, 𝒏𝒐𝒔 𝒄𝒐𝒈𝒆 𝒚 𝒏𝒐𝒔 𝒆𝒔𝒕𝒓𝒆𝒍𝒍𝒂, 𝒄𝒐𝒎𝒐 𝒆𝒍 𝒎𝒂𝒓 𝒆𝒔𝒕𝒓𝒆𝒍𝒍𝒂 𝒂 𝒍𝒐𝒔 𝒒𝒖𝒆 𝒑𝒓𝒆𝒕𝒆𝒏𝒅𝒆𝒏 𝒈𝒐𝒃𝒆𝒓𝒏𝒂𝒓𝒍𝒐. " Pensaba que iba a ser un tostón, Me equivoqué. Entretenido y a ratos divertido, Me he enamorado de la forma de escribir de Galdós, Eso sí, es larguito y hay que tomarselo con paciencia, Un libro con tantos buenos momento y otros no tanto, pero aun así nunca me vi motivada a dejar la lectura I put off reading this book for years because of its length.
It began a bit slowly with the focus on the Santa Cruz family, Once the focus changed to Fortunata and her family and acquaintances, the characters really came to life for me, The last few chapters are breathless! Fortunata and Jacinta is well worth the time needed for the read, The subtitle for this book should be "Two Stories of Married Women, Their Men, Their Aunts, Some Other People, and All of Their Crazy".
This is a massive book and I'm surprised that it took Galdós just a year to write it, There are a lot of characters here, a lot of different plot lines, all interconnected yet separate, and all quite enjoyable to read.
Some call him the Spanish Dickens, and that's fine, but I feel like Galdós is on a planet of his own.
Maybe it's a cultural thing, but this book felt richer and more vibrant than most of the Dickens I've read and that's saying something because I do adore Dickens.
Galdós was a realist, and realism drips from these pages, He wrote about cafe life in a way that made me want to throw everything away and run off to Spain to sit and talk politics and essentially do nothing with my life.
None of my final thoughts are going to give any credit to this epic novel, but as I read I jotted down some notes and they are below.
I'm leaving them unrevised, because they were my impressions while I read, so I don't need to expand on any of those thoughts or make corrections.
They are what they are,
I will stop here, with one thing more to say, . . Oh, poor Maxi. Poor, poor Maxi.
But they won't be able to confine my thoughts within these walls, I live among the,
Thoughts at the end of Volume I:
I've seen some comparisons to Dickens or Balzac.
And I get itth century literature, it's all the same, right But this guy seems to be much more accessible than those guys.
As much as I love Dickens, I'll be one of the first to admit he occasionally could be, . . erm, dry. I'd say if a comparison needs to be made and I'm not necessarily convinced that's important, this Galdós guy would be more like sitelinkWilkie Collins some sensationalism, a bit "kinder" to modern readers, that sort of thing.
I'm sure that comment will piss someone off,
It is also possible that the modernity of the book is thanks to the translator,
Man, so this story is cuhraaaazy,
Let's bring that eggsucking Fortunata back! I want more of her.
Jacinta needs bitchslapped. The amount of drama this woman creates for herself and her family, . . jeeeebus.
I'm not sure how I feel yet about Galdós's thoughts on women, At times it seems he is not too friendly towards his female characters, But then again, is he particularly friendly towards his male characters Juan is certainly nothing much to write home about.
It seems more appropriate that Galdós is more interested in discussing the flawed nature of humanity in general.
Thoughts at the end of Volume II:
We meet more characters, particularly the Rubín boys Juan Pablo, Nicolás, and Maximiliano and their aunt, Doña Lupe.
She's rather a helicopterparent, isn't she all coddling Maximiliano with his migraines and most likely encouraging the migraines by causing undue anxiety.
Maxi is a bundle of anxiety, Someone should give him a Valium,
Fortunata is back! And sluttier than ever! And Maxi, of course, being all anxious and migrainey, falls in love with her but his brother, Nicolás the priest steps in and insists that if she's gonna hook up with lil bro that she find Jeebus.
Oh, to think that just putting someone in a convent "solves" anything, How easy life must be to just throw someone in a convent like it's a freaking ChangeO machine.
Bad goes in, Good comes out,
But Juanito is also back! From the first volume, The one married to Jacinta,
Man, oh man, The scandal, eet ees deeleecious,
Still pondering on the author's intent towards women, He has things to say about women in love, but I believe he also has thoughts about men in love too verdict being that people in love are a bunch of idiots.
I'm interested that Galdós includes medical information Maxi's migraines, Lupe's double mastectomy from tumors in her past.
. . it's all very interesting and seems sort of unusual for a book of its time, As far as I can tell, he did not have a medical background but according to my sources read: Wikipedia, he was a Naturalist like sitelinkÉmile Zola and I wonder if there's a bit of a connection there.
Thoughts at the end of Volume III:
Meh, I felt this section sort of deteriorated near the end of the volume, like the author had so much to say that he just had to say it all.
Still good, but felt perhaps a bit forced in places, particularly in some of the dialogue, This could be just because the dialogue especially is melodramatic, so it comes across as reading disingenuous,
Fortunata is a real crackhead, I've known women like her women who think they have some prior claim but Fortunata takes it to a whole new level.
I almost have to give her props for that, It ain't easy being that crazy,
Thoughts at the end of Volume IV:
"Life ceased in him as a consequence of a ruptured heart, which produced an instantaneous commotion that vanished as quickly as it had come.
He was torn away from the great tree of humanity, a completely dry leaf whose imperceptible fibers had held him there.
The tree felt nothing in its myriad branches, Here and there, at the same moment, leaves and more useless leaves were falling but the next morning would reveal countless fresh new buds.
" p
I feel the story began to unravel a bit in this section, though to put my finger on it would be too difficult.
There were a lot of little threads that Galdós had to tie back together in the end, He accomplished it, but I feel there were a few times he had to stretch to get to the conclusions he wanted to.
RESEÑA AL DICTÁFONO
Qué gustazo leer las últimas líneas de un libro y saber que le vas a poner cinco estrellas.
Porque para mí Fortunata y Jacinta es sin duda una gran obra,
He disfrutado con la historia de las dos mujeres, con los personajes secundarios, con la ambientación, con la fina ironía del lenguaje de Galdós.
Con el final.
Es cierto que para algunos pasajes llenos de referencias políticas he tenido que ponerme un poco al día sobre el periodo en que transcurre la novela, que por cierto es una parte de nuestra historia muy interesante puesto que se sitúa en la época de la República, la llegada de Amadeo de Saboya y la restauración de los Borbones.
Pero sobre hay algo que me ha emocionado y es recordar aquella adolescente que preparaba la selectividad y a la que costaba dejar el libro de Fortunata y Jacinta para concentrarse en los exámenes esa personita con la mente llena de libros y de sueños.
Y releyendo Fortunata y Jacinta más de treinta años después he pensado en la suerte de haber disfrutado con tantos libros y sobre todo de haber vivido muchos de mis sueños.
Supongo que esa personita y yo seguimos teniendo algo en común, !Aunque solo sea que las dos le damos cinco estrellas a este libro y llevamos gafas de montura de pasta!
Había olvidado señalar que he releído Fortunata y Jacinta con la lectura conjunta de Trotalibros, aunque me he adelantado un poquillo en acabar porque no podía dejar de leer y porque Edith Wharton y el club Pickwick me esperan.
He disfrutado cada página de esta novela, de esta obra magistral,
Fortunata es toda una heroína, una chica atormentada por un amor, el gran amor,
Jacinta también vive atormentada, le falta algo que para ella es imprescindible para su felicidad,
Y Juanito, ese se lleva todo mi desprecio, en fin, que esta historia es todo un culebrón que te mantiene en vilo hasta el final.
Muy recomendable, un gran clásico que merece la fama que tiene,AUGadiscount coupon allowed me to purchase a new copy from Barnes amp Noble today, Many thanks Barnes amp Noble,
FEBread with theth Century Literature Group at Yahoo, This group reads the absolute best books,
Fortunata and Jacinta is an outstanding read, The entire time I spent reading this book, I felt as though I were sitting in a Spanish cafe gossiping with an old friend.
He knows everyone, everything about everyone, and has shared these stories with me,
Outstanding! I love this book! No sé por dónde empezar con esta reseña, "Fortunata y Jacinta" es una novela total, te ofrece todas las sensaciones que puedas desear porque sientes a través del elenco las alegrías y penas de los humanos, te enoja o divierte con la misma destreza artísitica.
Don Benito Pérez Galdós es capaz de dar voz a todo tipo de personajes, nada parece difícil para su habilidad como escritor: hombres, mujeres o niños, todos tienen su momento de gloria literaria que nos los deja grabados en nuestra memoria con carácter pedurable.
He leído varias reseñas sobre esta magna obra que no reconozco como apropiadas, Creo que Fortunata y Jacinta es una obra radicalmente feminista, Los personajes de la novela que te conmueven y con los que te gustaría identificarte son todos mujeres, ellas encarnan los valores auténticamente humanos.
Por el contrario, los masculinos son, casi en su totalidad, decididamente reprobables o dignos de lástima, claramente inferiores, partiendo del Delfín, un parásito gandul, hasta Platón o los Rubín.
Mención aparte merece el pequeño Pituso, en las páginas en las que aparece demuestra don Benito su genio con la descripción de los niños los que hayan leído "El doctor Centeno", por ejemplo, lo saben.
Tampoco creo que la obra se pueda considerar anticlerical, vista con nuestros ojos, puesto que el personaje de la Santa es el que es recogido con más cariño por el novelista.
A través de las circunstancias y sufrimientos de "Fortunata y Jacinta" te sientes identificado con gente de todas las clases sociales del siglo XIX, la vida de Madrid no puede estar mejor descrita, todas las desgracias quedan mitigadas por un tono socarrón y las alegrías por el sarcasmo, don Benito es un maestro del estoicismo y siempre da más de lo que te esperas de una novela.
Spanish version:
Free download available at sitelinkProject Gutenberg,
According to Free Literature, Fortunata and Jacinta wasn't translated untilarticle at Neglected Books sitelinkhere,