The role of Augusto Pérez: A study of Niebla

Abstract

From the opening pages, the reader immedi ately observes that Niebla is about a form of art or, more specifically, about the novel. The pro logues discuss the subject, but the theme is de veloped, above all, by Augusto, the central protagonist or agonist. The first chapter begins with Augusto's entrance into a reality he avoided prior to the writing of the novel. As Augusto engages in activities he is creating his external reality and the very text of which he is a part. Clearly, Augusto is an artist in his own right, and the novel's sequence of events leads logically to his confrontation with Unamuno as they debate the question of authorship and authoritiy with respect to the work. Although the existential, psychological and lit erary dimensions of the novel are connected, this paper will focus on one central theme: the nature of artistic production. The context in which this activity occurs, the process it initiates, and the problem it occasions are a primary concern of Niebla and the topic of this study. Niebla?mist?by its very title suggests a world of endless flux and a novelist-creator trying to give order to this amorphous substance or shape less mass of reality. The artist is Augusto who enacts this role as he tells his tale or lives his life. Let us recall from the outset that if Unamuno created Augusto and put him into motion, it is Augusto who acts and make decisions which allow him to develop his existence. Augusto him self defines the part he plays: Como yo ahora aqu?*, representando a solas mi comedia, hecho actor y espectador a la vez (XVIII, 619).1 Carlos Blanco Aguinaga and Leon Livingstone emphasize Augusto's function as a self-conscious actor, and in turn, author, whose projection of self-created images establish and preserve the personality.2 And this theory, as Robert Alter points out, has ramifications for it establishes Niebla as an experiment in the possibilities of freedom in fiction writing. Alter compares Un amuno's nimia to D.H. Lawrence's narrative form and writes: . .and Lawrence's new open form, in which protagonists end up talking about their lives as though they were novelists deter mining how to handle the fiction of their own experience, would be one possible realization of Unamuno's program.3 Support for these theories comes directly from the text as Unamuno through V?ctor explains a character's function in the nivola: 'Voy a escribir una novela, pero voy a escribirla como se vive, sin saber lo que vendra . . . Mis personajes se ir?n haciendo seg?n obren y hablen;. . .su car?c ter se ir? formando poco a poco... (XVII, 615). If Augusto's independence makes Niebla a spon taneous or viviparous novel,4 such a classification reveals only a partial truth about the compostion since the work has a carefully articulated plan which relies heavily on August as the author of his own life. Paul Olson makes this observation and concludes: Paradoxically, the idea of living and writing 'sin plan previo' appears to be a basic 'plan previo' for this novel. . .5 With Augusto's status as a creator and consequently, an artist established, Unamuno devises a worthy counter part to exemplify the nivola s intent, as we shall see.