Gibraltar Interlude: The Artistry of Blasco Ibáñez's Luna Benamor

Hamilton College

Vicente Blasco Ibáñez's Valencian novels (1895-1902) will always stand as the author's most significant literary achievement. Most critics continue to ignore, however, that many of his later writings also exhibit, in particular ways at least, artistic attributes which are as praiseworthy as those of his first works. This is particularly true in the case of the so-called «psychological» novels, those pieces which, along with four earlier works of more overt social protest, constitute the group generally referred to as the «Novels of Spain.» In these writings, published between 1906 and 1909, Blasco's didactic stance and polemical view points become less prominent, having given way to a somewhat more pronounced focus on human feelings and development of character. The last of these writings to reach the public is the novelette Luna Benamor, one of the forgotten gems of Blasco which still merit careful critical analysis.

The genesis and composition of the story actually precede the writing of two thesis novels (La bodega and La horda, both published in 1905) although it was not until May 27, 1909 that the collection of short stories, sketches and notes in which Luna Benamor was included was finally published in Spain. (The novelette had, according to J. L. León Roca, already appeared somewhat earlier in a Latin American journal [298]). We know that the story was inspired by Blasco's visit to Gibraltar, on the occasion of the settling of his sons Mario and Julio César into the Colegio Inglés and his acquaintance with the Jewish businessman Salomón Cohen, who was subsequently put in charge of representing the boys in school matters (León Roca 298).

It is clear that, in writing Luna Benamor, Blasco was motivated by two primary goals: to explore a tender love interest set in conflict with external obstacles, and, more importantly, to depict local landscape and the customs of the Sephardic Jews and other Gibraltarians. It should come as no surprise to readers of the Valencian works that the novelette is a notable piece of writing precisely because it reflects Blasco's most significant artistic talents: his ability to compose graphic, moving, at times poetic descriptions of nature and to transmit remarkably vivid, artistically pertinent depictions of native customs and ways of thought. We shall see in a moment why R. Cansinos Assens was moved to say that, in general, «Luna Benamor parece una acuarela pintada» (124).

The story's plot is, necessarily, extremely simple. We meet Luis Aguirre, a young member of the Spanish foreign service, as he awaits a boat to take him from Gibraltar to his assignment as consul in Australia. Amidst the varied and cosmopolitan atmosphere of the Colony, he falls in love with a young Jewess, Luna Benamor, the daughter of a Rabat exporter of Moroccan tapestries, now living with an elderly grandfather who is a successful local money changer of sephardic descent, and with her uncle, his wife and their two daughters. Although Luna comes to reciprocate Aguirre's love, their differing religious views, her family traditions and her childhood betrothal to a successful Jewish businessman from Buenos Aires all oppose the union. Luis befriends a sickly Indian bazaar keeper from Madras named Khiamull, whose comments serve to reinforce the protagonist's realization that these barriers cannot be overcome. At the end Khiamull's death coincides with Luna's final, tearful rejection of Luis and his departure for Australia. Blasco thus reaches a conclusion

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which is the opposite of that of his novel Los muertos mandan, written in the same year (where Jaime Febrer and Margalida overcome the weight of family tradition and differences of social status to find happiness). Nevertheless, the author avoids any kind of tragic, quasi-philosophical, or fatalistic tone, in favor of a gentle melancholy, expressing Aguirre's hope that «tal vez su alma frágil de pájaro sobreviviese en las gaviotas que aletea ban en torno al Peñón; tal vez cantase en las espumas rugientes de las cuevas submarinas, para acompañar los juramentos de otros aman tés que llegarían a su hora, como llega la ilusión engañosa, la dulce mentira del amor, a darnos nuevas fuerzas para que sigamos nuestro camino» (Luna Benamor 452).

Although Blasco's descriptions of the Gibraltar landscape do not convey the degree of emotional, sentimental involvement evident in the Valencian novels, he nevertheless continues to excel (as he did in Los muertos mandan) in his colorful, occasionally poetic, effusive and heavily visual depictions of local scenery. The use of panorama, shades of light, graphic, sensual colorings, a dynamic sense of movement, a vivid immediacy and exactness of detail -all within a delicately subjective framework- combine in typically striking, impressionistic outbursts:

Typically, the use of reiteration (here, of successive gerund phrases) adds to the sense of continuous, temporal movement, as does the near constant utilization of the imperfect tense. And it is important to note that Blasco's descriptions are rarely offered gratuitously, but rather are meant to relate in significant ways to aspects of theme or characterization (here, in references to the distinguishing British mist, as we shall see later).

The same relevance can be seen in the depictions of nature which, as was the case particularly in Entre naranjos (1900), serve as a backdrop and stimulant to the growing love between Luna and Aguirre:

Blasco continues to excel, as he did in his Valencian novels, in his ability to paint in but a few strokes of the pen striking, vivid and realistic pictures of his characters:

As can be seen in the first example above, Blasco continues to display a predilection for animal imagery, although this is less prevalent than in the naturalistic circumstances of his Valencian novels:

But without a doubt Blasco's most striking use of metaphor and animal imagery is seen in this magnificent seascape:

The simile continues to prevail as one of Blasco's favorite stylistic devices:

And the author cannot refrain from including a number of (typically shallow) bits of symbolism. For example, the sound of the canon at daybreak and nightfall suggests the reality of external control which the lovers at first attempt to ignore, a signal which shuts down not only the Gibraltarians' daily activity but also the lovers' hope for the future; it is also the sound which drowns out the church choirs (428, 445 and 448). The Colony's fortifications and the wall of rock itself come to mirror the barriers between Luna and Aguirre (see particularly 444-45). Blasco seems to become confused, however, when he makes a point of contrasting some playful English Protestant church music with the melancholic «death groan» of a Catholic choir (448), as an apparent way of reinforcing our realization of the religious differences which Luna and Aguirre are discussing at the moment; Aguirre him self, however, has been characterized as both the Catholic unwilling to convert and the visitor who feels and acts more like an inglés than a Jew (428).

Perhaps the most significant similarity between Luna Benamor and the Valencian novels is the vivid use of artistically pertinent costumbrismo, the inclusion of graphic delineation of regional customs. These passages fall clearly into two categories: (1) a catalogue of details concerning the daily life of the Gibraltarians in general, their shops, their goods, their manner of dress, etc. We witness the arrival of sailors, the routine of the British soldiers and a relatively lengthy transcription of Andalucian dialect (this and the lovers' long conversations contrast with the extremely sparse use of regional dialogue in the Valencian novels). Most prominent are Blasco's summaries of the unique, exotic range of socially independent racial groups, brought together by business interests but retaining their own ethnic customs and religious practices amidst an atmosphere of mutual intolerance, suspicion and hatred. And (2) a more focused attention on the customs of the Sephardic Jews living on the Rock, including the Fiesta de las Cabañas, during which Aguirre first sees Luna, the trepidation felt by the Jews living in Rabat during Luna's child hood, the way in which Luna's mother gives her sickly daughter a second name in order to prevent death (el Huerco) from claiming her, and the ambivalence felt by old Samuel Aboad towards the Spaniards. By means of these passages, the sharp differences between Aguirre's background and that of other races are highlighted from the start, thus relating to the obstacles later encountered by the two lovers.

With respect to the story's characterization, there is never any attempt (or time, for that matter, in so short a space) to develop the main figures or their relationship beyond a strictly superficial level.

Although the narrative is written almost entirely from the point of view of Aguirre (except for one passage from old Samuel's perspective, three from that of Luna and occasional, omniscient comments by the author), there is no attempt, even at moments of estilo indirecto libre, to lend his character any kind of depth. His background (orphaned but with the influence of a powerful family name and probable pressures to continue the family diplomatic tradition, etc.) is left unexplored. We learn that he is basically a good person (note, for example, the sensitive way in which he humors Samuel and the old man's illusions about the consul's background [438]). He is, however, unrealistic and naive («Correremos el mundo... siempre juntos» he exclaims to Luna, even while hearing her more realistic view and then admitting that he would never convert to Judaism [441]). Aguirre is, above all, a type character, and it is for this reason that he is almost always referred to by the author as «el español» or «el cónsul» Blasco's purpose is more to reveal him as a representative of his race and religion. (Luna, also, is presented to an extent as a personification -in Blasco's eyes- of the race. However, as we shall see in a moment, the other Jewish characters, more than she, appear to be almost

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caricatures of either the servility or the capitalistic obsession which the author saw as primary characteristics of the people. Lunas uncle Zabulón also serves to focus our attention on the historical divisions between the Spaniards and the Jews.)

On the other hand, Blasco continues to excel in the portrait of minor, more purely regional or costumbristic types. Samuel Abad transcends his racial-religious (Sephardic) status in his ingenuous, romantic admiration of things Spanish and in his teary-eyed emotionalism. Like tío Paloma of Cañas y barro (1902), he represents an age gone by. Even more noticeably, the Indian merchant Khiamull -who except for voicing the theme of racial divisions passes almost incidentally through the story- is a fascinating figure, a world traveler who, before succumbing to the killing humidity of Gibraltar, dreams of returning home and «recordaba su lejano país del sol con la voz melancólica de un proscrito, su gran río sagrado, las vírgenes indostánicas coronadas de flores...» (431), Khiamuf is the character who most closely fits the mold of the «old wise one» seen in the Valencian novels²².

The thematic content of the novelette was clearly more important to Blasco than was characterization. Nevertheless, Luna Benamor does not have the pseudo-philosophical overtones of Los muertos mandan, nor is the ending here negative or tragic to the degree that the desenlace of the first novel was positive. But, like Benito Pérez Galdós in Gloria, the author does appear intent on showing that love (along with Aguirre's fascination with the very differences between the two lovers) is not sufficiently strong to overcome the religious and racial dichotomy, that, in Khiamull's words, «nada puede el hombre con las simpatías y repulsiones de la sangre» (440). Here the dead do command; religious intolerance²³, Aguirre's feeling that «las personas decentes de todo el mundo eran católicos» (441) and the Jewish tradition of arranged marriages prevent the possibility of union. In addition, there is a slight suggestion of a more transcending, even naturalistic dimension in the description of nature as an immense, omnipotent force, oblivious to the feelings of two insignificant hormigas, and in Luna's reasoning that one «debía seguir su destino» (448).

Aguirre tries to maintain that «en amor no debe haber reflexión» (439), that «todos somos iguales ante la vida» and that «no hay más que una verdad: el amor» (448). He states that love dispels our pride and makes us respectful of life's mysteries (just as the simple love and faith of Luna's mother won out against el Huerco). Yet, hypocritically, he clings to the supposed superiority of his Catholic heritage. The death of Khiamull, the «pobre poeta que habla soñado con la luz y el amor» (451), represents the final affirmation of the futility of Aguirre's illusion.

Related to the piece's thematic content is the whole question of Blasco's attitude to wards the Jews. For the background of this important question, we have only to turn to Paul Smith's excellent study of the Jewish question in Blasco's novels. Smith recounts how the novelette follows in great part from some of the «Recuerdos de viaje» published in El Pueblo after the writer's 1904 visit to Gibraltar, how Blasco was moved by his relationship with a group of likable Jewish youths whom he befriended there, and how these were the years in which Blasco rejected his strong anti-Semitic posture of the 1890's to join in what Cansinos describes as «la emoción de la reciente anagnórisis de españoles y sefardíes» (119).

Nevertheless, the novelist is considerably less sympathetic and less charitable towards the Jews in Luna Benamor than he was in Los muertos mandan. A fingering antipathy to the Jewish race is noticeable in at least three areas: (1) his stereotypical presentation of the obsession with money and materialistic motives:

(2) physical descriptions and references to servility (there is little of the idealization of Jewish women found in the 1904 Gibraltar sketches):

(3) the treatment of women:

Finally, it is significant to note that Aguirre is first attracted to Luna precisely because she appears to be an elegant young Englishwoman.

It may be true that Blasco was attempting here to mitigate somewhat his fierce youthful anti-Semitism. The examples above, however, make clear that he still scorns what he feels are aspects of the Jewish race in general: an inordinate, materialistic ambition, a lack of self-esteem, and a number of unattractive physical features.

With regard to narrative structure, Luna Benamor is, typically, a tightly and coherently constructed piece, despite some confusion in references to time. (Aguirre at the end regrets leaving his «paraíso durante tres meses», although close examination of the text reveals that only about two months have elapsed since his arrival.) The plot follows a simple and straight line from introduction exposition, through the development of the love interest, to a climactic lovers' confrontation, and concluding with a brief epilogue. The structure of the piece can thus be outlined as follows:

Exposition: Chapter I -Aguirre's arrival and the presentation of the Gibraltar environment.

Development: Chapter II -Aguirre meets Luna's family and then Luna herself.

Chapter III -The relationship deepens until the two agree to be novios.

Chapter IV -Their love reaches its fullest point, despite foreshadowings of future difficulties (the grey sky of winter, etc.)

Chapter V -Crisis and confrontation.

Epilogue: Chapter V (final pages) -Khiamull's death and Aguirre's departure.

Blasco has made considerable effort to create an artistically unified work, as exemplified by the care with which the costumbristic pauses are integrated into the story of Aguirre and Luna. This is particularly evident in the relationship of the plot fine and thematic content with the description of the Fiesta de las Cabañas, Khiamull's background and the Gibraltar environment. Aguirre, for example, reflects on his situation and the «estrechez de las fortificaciones, sometidos a una disciplina militar» (427); at another moment he contemplates the ruins which once housed «la cárcel llena de gente de todos los países, especialmente españoles» (446).

Further unity is attained by the carefully spaced presence and commentary of Khiamull, who is prominent at the beginning of the story, in the very middle (Chapter III, where his statement of the story's theme foreshadows Aguirre's failure), and at the very end, when his death parallels Aguirre's misfortune.

Thus Luna Benamor, while revealing little depth in theme or characterization, is, nevertheless, far from an insignificant piece of literature. In some ways it shows Vicente Blasco Ibáñez at his best. This is particularly true in its remarkably vivid and expressive descriptions of regional landscape, its vigorous, graphic depictions of occasional character types and its artistically pertinent presentation of customs and social environment. Again we are reminded that Blasco's Valencian works are not the only ones which deserve serious critical consideration.

Blasco Ibáñez, Vicente. Luna Benamor. Obras completas. Vol. 2. Madrid: Aguilar, 1958.

Cansinos Assens, R. Los judíos en la literatura española. Buenos Aires: Columna, 1937.

León Roca, J. L. Vicente Blasco Ibáñez. Valencia: Prometeo, 1967.

Medina, Jeremy T. The Valencian Novels of Vicente Blasco Ibáñez. Valencia: Albatros, 1984.

Smith, Paul C. «Blasco Ibáñez and the Theme of the Jews.» Hispania 56 (1973): 282-94.

Hispania [Publicaciones periódicas]. Volume 73, Number 4, December 1990