Vicente Blasco Ibáñez

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Outline:

Who is he?BiographyWriting careerStyle of writingBibliographyConclusionReferences

Who is He ?

journalist, politician and best-selling Spanish novelist in various genres 

He won recognition in the English-speaking world due to Hollywood films adapted from his works.

 (29 January 1867 – 28 January 1928)

Biography

He was born in Valencia in the family of merchant.

He finished studying law, but hardly practised.

He was a militant Republican partisan in his youth and founded a controversary newspaper, “El Pueblo” in his hometown.

Biography

At the age of 18 he wrote an antimonarchist poem for which he was sent to prison—the first of his 30 punishments for political beliefs.

He made many enemies and was shot and almost killed in one dispute. The bullet was caught in the clasp of his belt.

In 1898 Blasco Ibáñez was elected by a landslide to the Spanish Parliament as a deputy from Valencia, and this spared him further persecution.

Biography

Biography

He was married María Blasco del Cacho.

However,  he had several stormy love affairs.

She was his first wife, but their life was not very happy, she died in 1925.

Wedding 18-11-1891

His wife

Their children: Mario, Libertad y Julio César 

Biography

Disillusioned by his stint in Parliament, Blasco Ibáñez withdrew from politics in 1907 and moved to Argentina, where he lost a lot of money attempting to create two agricultural colonies. 

Tired and disgusted with government failures and inaction, he moved to Paris at the beginning of World War I.

Biography

He was a supporter of the Allies in World War I.

He finally settled as a self-exile in Menton, France, and devoted himself fully to writing.

Biography

In 1917 he financed, wrote, and co-directed the earliest screen version of "Blood and Sand", his only venture into cinema; after that he was content to sell the lucrative movie rights to his books.

He died in 1928 and following his death his remains were returned to Valencia, as he had requested.

Biography

His epitaph reads: “I want to rest in the most unpretentious valencian cemetery. Along with the Mare Nostrum that filled of ideals my spirit, I want that my body was mixed with the land of Valencia that is the love of my loves."

Writing Career

His first published novel was “La araña negra” ('The Black Spider') in 1892

His novels can be easily classified into basic genres: regional, psychological, historical and Cosmopolitan.

Writing career

Ibáñez achieved his greatest success from the cosmopolitan European novels, of which Los cuatro jinetes del Apocalipsis (The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, 1916) is the best. Other novels in this genre include: Mare Nostrum (1918), and Los enemigos de la mujer (1919), both of which are also war novels.

Style of writing

His works also show  the influence of Naturalism which he would most likely have assimilated through reading Émile Zola.

The characters in works are determined by the interaction of heredity, environment and social conditions.

Later,  his plots became more sensational and melodramatic

Bibliography

Fantasías, leyendas y tradiciones (1887)Historia de la Revolución española en el siglo XIX (1893)La araña negra (1892)¡Viva la República! (1892)Arroz y tartana (1894)Cuentos valencianos (1896) La condenada (1900) Flor de mayo (1896)La barraca (1898)Entre naranjos (1900) Cañas y barro (1902)La catedral (1903)El intruso (1904) La bodega (1905) La horda (1905) Los cuatro jinetes del Apocalipsis (1916)Los muertos mandan (1908) Sangre y arena (1908)Luna Benamor (1909)Los enemigos de la mujer (1919)El paraíso de las mujeres (1922)El papa del mar (1925)A los pies de Venus (1926)En busca del Gran Khan (1928)En el país del arte (1896)Oriente (1910)La Argentina y sus grandezas (1910)La vuelta al mundo de un novelista (1925)

Conclusion

To sum up, I can say that Vicente Blasco Ibáñez was an outstanding person of the beginning of 20th century. In spite of all difficult circumstances of this time, he preferred to express his views, he loved his country sincerely. More over, he was a talented author raising important issues of his time so that his works are still popular and relevant.

References:

http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=7268122

http://www.ctspanish.com/literature/ibeneaz.htm https://

www.escritores.org/biografias/444-vicente-blasco-ibanez http://lanaveva.wordpress.com/2011/02/23/maria-blasco-

del-cacho-primera-esposa-de-vicente-blasco-ibanez/

http://www.cervantesvirtual.com/bib_autor/blascoibanez/pcuartonivel.jsp?conten=cronologia

http://global.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/68999/Vicente-Blasco-Ibanez

http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/35509.Vicente_Blasco_Ib_ez