Identificador: TDX:557
Autores: Corretger, Montserrat, 1950-
Resumen:
OF DOCTORAL THESIS BY MONTSERRAT CORRETGER SÀEZ<br/>THE LIFE AND WORKS OF ALFONS MASERAS: A SPECIFIC STUDY OF HIS NARRATIVE<br/>The thesis studies the biography and literary work of Alfons Maseras, a writer considered only superficially by contemporary criticism which has relegated him to the list of second rate modernist authors and which ignores information such as the date when he died or the fact that he arrived in Barcelona during his infancy and not as a young man, as has always been stated.The thesis studies the intellectual horizons of Alfons Maseras, who was one of the most effective disseminators of Catalan culture in Europe and who introduced and expanded foreign models in Catalonia in his role of literary correspondent, something which is essential for understanding Catalan intellectual circles between 1906 and 1939. It also establishes the writer's political creed and his role in the historic events of the first half of the 20th century. He was allied to the CNR (Catalan Republican Nationalist Centre) and its organ El Poble Català (The Catalan People) and in Paris in the 1920s he was editor of Le Courrier Catalan in the struggle against the dictatorship. During the 1930s he continued to live out his Catalan ideals and dedicated himself fully to literary creation and translation. During the final years of his life, during the Civil War and his brief exile, he acted as the voice of the public conscience, resulting from his many activities in defence of Catalan culture and republican institutions.<br/>Alfons Maseras had cultivated an interest in poetry and theatre in which he was less successful despite having published and staged some plays. In addition to his narrative corpus, which includes twelve novels, nine collections of short stories, eleven novellas, four books of various writings, four biographies and a collection of essays, he was a journalist who made an important number of collaborations in Catalan and foreign publications, which are evaluated in the thesis on the grounds that they provide clues to understanding his narrative. Ninety publications have been tracked down, from which the thesis looks at and discusses some 1.400 journalistic articles and literary collaborations. These articles and collaborations are taken from the literary supplements and sections of chapters which investigate their most important aspects. The thesis systemizes and comments on the entire body of Maseras' poetry, theatre, essays and prose, and makes a monographic study of his narrative, using an analytic method which harmonizes both the biographical and creative aspects which interlaced with each other.<br/>The study is divided into two parts: the first, which consists of the first five chapters, deals with Maseras' life and activities as a journalist, translator, poet and playwright, and the second, which makes up the remaining four chapters, analyzes his narrative work. <br/>Chapters I, II, III, IV and V comment on the author's biography, depicting the main productive stages of his life and studying his non-narrative work, particularly his journalism. The first chapter describes and interprets the foundations of life and work and studies in depth his family roots and his first literary attempts. The second analyzes his formative intellectual circles, his first journeys and his initial poetic output. The third and fourth chapters form the nucleus of the study because they look at the second and third decades of the century where Maseras intervened directly in the most important political and cultural events in Catalonia. They analyze the numerous practical and theoretical activities which he carried out in relation to the Great War. He was involved in the Comitè d'Amics de la Unitat Moral d'Europa (the Committee of Friends for the Moral Unity of Europe), Comitè de Germanor amb els Voluntaris Catalans (the Committee of Brotherhood with the Catalan Volunteers), Conferències de les Nacionalitats de París i Lausanne (the Conferences of the Nationalities in Paris and Lausanne), the treatise Pancatalanisme (Pan-Catalanism), the Pro-Serbia and Pro-Lithuania manifestos, the campaign Pro-Autonomia de Catalunya (campaign in favour of Catalan autonomy), the 'Plebiscit del poble català per l'Autonomia' (Plebiscite of the Catalan People regarding Autonomy) in the Tribune Libre des Nationalités, etc. The chapters also analyze his stays in Paris and the resulting contacts he established with foreign writers. The fifth chapter analyzes his later life in Barcelona, the defining intellectual, social and familial conditions of his work and his tragic death. <br/> Chapters VI, VII, VIII and IX study Maseras' narrative corpus which is divided into four stages based on his ideological and aesthetic evolution and the biographical and historical-cultural context. Also described are the lines of thought and the formal criteria of each period. Each chapter begins with an introduction which generically studies the thought, the literary sources and the aesthetic and thematic elements from each stage of his production. After this each chapter analyzes each one of the author's works from that period, focussing on their ideological, structural and aesthetic aspects and on the treatment they received at the hands of contemporary criticism. <br/>The thesis establishes Maseras' thought and aesthetic position in each work and in each stage of his narrative production, taking into account the Catalan and European literary context in each case.
Repositori URV