Dona Perfecta Read online

  Produced by Dagny; John Bickers

  DONA PERFECTA

  by B. PEREZ GALDOS

  Translated from the Spanish by Mary J. Serrano

  INTRODUCTION

  The very acute and lively Spanish critic who signs himself Clarin, andis known personally as Don Leopoldo Alas, says the present Spanish novelhas no yesterday, but only a day-before-yesterday. It does not derivefrom the romantic novel which immediately preceded that: the novel,large or little, as it was with Cervantes, Hurtado de Mendoza, Quevedo,and the masters of picaresque fiction.

  Clarin dates its renascence from the political revolution of 1868,which gave Spanish literature the freedom necessary to the fiction thatstudies to reflect modern life, actual ideas, and current aspirations;and though its authors were few at first, "they have never beenadventurous spirits, friends of Utopia, revolutionists, or impatientprogressists and reformers." He thinks that the most daring, the mostadvanced, of the new Spanish novelists, and the best by far, is DonBenito Perez Galdos.

  I should myself have made my little exception in favor of Don ArmandoPalacio Valdes, but Clarin speaks with infinitely more authority, and Iam certainly ready to submit when he goes on to say that Galdos is nota social or literary insurgent; that he has no political or religiousprejudices; that he shuns extremes, and is charmed with prudence;that his novels do not attack the Catholic dogmas--though they deal soseverely with Catholic bigotry--but the customs and ideas cherishedby secular fanaticism to the injury of the Church. Because this isso evident, our critic holds, his novels are "found in the bosom offamilies in every corner of Spain." Their popularity among all classesin Catholic and prejudiced Spain, and not among free-thinking studentsmerely, bears testimony to the fact that his aim and motive areunderstood and appreciated, although his stories are apparently so oftenanti-Catholic.

  I

  Dona Perfecta is, first of all, a story, and a great story, but it iscertainly also a story that must appear at times potently, and evenbitterly, anti-Catholic. Yet it would be a pity and an error to read itwith the preoccupation that it was an anti-Catholic tract, for really itis not that. If the persons were changed in name and place, andmodified in passion to fit a cooler air, it might equally seem ananti-Presbyterian or anti-Baptist tract; for what it shows in the lightof their own hatefulness and cruelty are perversions of any religion,any creed. It is not, however, a tract at all; it deals in artisticlargeness with the passion of bigotry, as it deals with the passion oflove, the passion of ambition, the passion of revenge. But Galdosis Spanish and Catholic, and for him the bigotry wears a Spanish andCatholic face. That is all.

  Up to a certain time, I believe, Galdos wrote romantic or idealisticnovels, and one of these I have read, and it tired me very much. It wascalled "Marianela," and it surprised me the more because I was alreadyacquainted with his later work, which is all realistic. But one does notturn realist in a single night, and although the change in Galdos wasrapid it was not quite a lightning change; perhaps because it wasnot merely an outward change, but artistically a change of heart. Hisacceptance in his quality of realist was much more instant than hisconversion, and vastly wider; for we are told by the critic whom I havebeen quoting that Galdos's earlier efforts, which he called _EpisodiosNacionales_, never had the vogue which his realistic novels haveenjoyed.

  These were, indeed, tendencious, if I may Anglicize a very necessaryword from the Spanish _tendencioso_. That is, they dealt with veryobvious problems, and had very distinct and poignant significations,at least in the case of "Dona Perfecta," "Leon Roch," and "Gloria." Instill later novels, Emilia Pardo-Bazan thinks, he has comprehended that"the novel of to-day must take note of the ambient truth, and realizethe beautiful with freedom and independence." This valiant lady, inthe campaign for realism which she made under the title of "La CuestionPalpitante"--one of the best and strongest books on the subject--countshim first among Spanish realists, as Clarin counts him first amongSpanish novelists. "With a certain fundamental humanity," she says,"a certain magisterial simplicity in his creations, with the naturaltendency of his clear intelligence toward the truth, and with thefrankness of his observation, the great novelist was always disposedto pass over to realism with arms and munitions; but his aestheticinclinations were idealistic, and only in his latest works has headopted the method of the modern novel, fathomed more and more the humanheart, and broken once for all with the picturesque and with the typicalpersonages, to embrace the earth we tread."

  For her, as I confess for me, "Dona Perfecta" is not realisticenough--realistic as it is; for realism at its best is not tendencious.It does not seek to grapple with human problems, but is richly contentwith portraying human experiences; and I think Senora Pardo-Bazan isright in regarding "Dona Perfecta" as transitional, and of a period whenthe author had not yet assimilated in its fullest meaning the faith hehad imbibed.

  II

  Yet it is a great novel, as I said; and perhaps because it istransitional it will please the greater number who never really arriveanywhere, and who like to find themselves in good company _en route_. Itis so far like life that it is full of significations which pass beyondthe persons and actions involved, and envelop the reader, as if he toowere a character of the book, or rather as if its persons were menand women of this thinking, feeling, and breathing world, and he mustrecognize their experiences as veritable facts. From the first momentto the last it is like some passage of actual events in which you cannotwithhold your compassion, your abhorrence, your admiration, any morethan if they took place within your personal knowledge. Where theytranscend all facts of your personal knowledge, you do not accuse themof improbability, for you feel their potentiality in yourself, andeasily account for them in the alien circumstance. I am not saying thatthe story has no faults; it has several. There are tags of romanticismfluttering about it here and there; and at times the author permitshimself certain old-fashioned literary airs and poses and artifices,which you simply wonder at. It is in spite of these, and with all thesedefects, that it is so great and beautiful a book.

  III

  What seems to be so very admirable in the management of the story is theauthor's success in keeping his own counsel. This may seem a veryeasy thing; but, if the reader will think over the novelists of hisacquaintance, he will find that it is at least very uncommon. Theymostly give themselves away almost from the beginning, either by theiranxiety to hide what is coming, or their vanity in hinting what greatthings they have in store for the reader. Galdos does neither the onenor the other. He makes it his business to tell the story as it grows;to let the characters unfold themselves in speech and action; to permitthe events to happen unheralded. He does not prophesy their course, hedoes not forecast the weather even for twenty-four hours; the atmospherebecomes slowly, slowly, but with occasional lifts and reliefs, of such abrooding breathlessness, of such a deepening density, that you feel thewild passion-storm nearer and nearer at hand, till it bursts at last;and then you are astonished that you had not foreseen it yourself fromthe first moment.

  Next to this excellent method, which I count the supreme characteristicof the book merely because it represents the whole, and the otherfacts are in the nature of parts, is the masterly conception of thecharacters. They are each typical of a certain side of human nature,as most of our personal friends and enemies are; but not exclusively ofthis side or that. They are each of mixed motives, mixed qualities; noneof them is quite a monster; though those who are badly mixed do suchmonstrous things.

  Pepe Rey, who is such a good fellow--so kind, and brave, and upright,and generous, so fine a mind, and so high a soul--is tactless andimprudent; he even condescends to the thought of intrigue; and thoughhe rejects his plots at last, his nature has once harbored deceit. DonInocencio, the priest, whose contro
l of Dona Perfecta's conscience hasvitiated the very springs of goodness in her, is by no means bad, asidefrom his purposes. He loves his sister and her son tenderly, and wishesto provide for them by the marriage which Pepe's presence threatens toprevent. The nephew, though selfish and little, has moments of almostbeing a good fellow; the sister, though she is really such a lamb ofmeekness, becomes a cat, and scratches Don Inocencio dreadfully when heweakens in his design against Pepe.

  Rosario, one of the sweetest and purest images of girlhood that I knowin fiction, abandons herself with equal passion to the love she feelsfor her cousin Pepe, and to the love she feels for her mother, DonaPerfecta. She is ready to fly with him, and yet she betrays him to hermother's pitiless hate.

  But it is Dona Perfecta herself who is the transcendent figure, themost powerful creation of the book. In her, bigotry and its fellow-vice,hypocrisy, have done their perfect work, until she comes near to beinga devil, and really does some devil's deeds. Yet even she is not withoutsome extenuating traits. Her bigotry springs from her conscience, andshe is truly devoted to her daughter's eternal welfare; she is of sucha native frankness that at a certain point she tears aside her mask ofdissimulation and lets Pepe see all the ugliness of her perverted soul.She is wonderfully managed. At what moment does she begin to hate him,and to wish to undo her own work in making a match between him andher daughter? I could defy anyone to say. All one knows is that at onemoment she adores her brother's son, and at another she abhors him, andhas already subtly entered upon her efforts to thwart the affection shehas invited in him for her daughter.

  Caballuco, what shall I say of Caballuco? He seems altogether bad, butthe author lets one imagine that this cruel, this ruthless brute musthave somewhere about him traits of lovableness, of leniency, thoughhe never lets one see them. His gratitude to Dona Perfecta, even hismurderous devotion, is not altogether bad; and he is certainly worsethan nature made him, when wrought upon by her fury and the suggestionof Don Inocencio. The scene where they work him up to rebellion andassassination is a compendium of the history of intolerance; as themean little conceited city of Orbajosas is the microcosm of bigoted andreactionary Spain.

  IV

  I have called, or half-called, this book tendencious; but in a certainlarger view it is not so. It is the eternal interest of passion workingupon passion, not the temporary interest of condition antagonizingcondition, which renders "Dona Perfecta" so poignantly interesting, andwhich makes its tragedy immense. But there is hope as well as despair insuch a tragedy. There is the strange support of a bereavement in it,the consolation of feeling that for those who have suffered unto death,nothing can harm them more; that even for those who have inflicted theirsuffering this peace will soon come.

  "Is Perez Galdos a pessimist?" asks the critic Clarin. "No, certainly;but if he is not, why does he paint us sorrows that seem inconsolable?Is it from love of paradox? Is it to show that his genius, which can doso much, can paint the shadow lovelier than the light? Nothing of this.Nothing that is not serious, honest, and noble, is to be found in thisnovelist. Are they pessimistic, those ballads of the North, that alwaysend with vague resonances of woe? Are they pessimists, those singers ofour own land, who surprise us with tears in the midst of laughter? IsNature pessimistic, who is so sad at nightfall that it seems as if daywere dying forever? . . . The sadness of art, like that of nature, isa form of hope. Why is Christianity so artistic? Because it is thereligion of sadness."

  W. D. HOWELLS.

  DONA PERFECTA