Eugenio Noël

Eugenio Noel, pseudonym of Eugenio Muñoz Díaz (Madrid, September 6, 1885-Barcelona, April 23, 1936), was a novelist, essayist, and publicist. Spaniard, who was signified as a bitter detractor of bullfighting and "flamenquismo".

Biography

He was born on September 6, 1885 in Madrid. From humble origins, he studied with the Piarists and showed a great passion for reading. He entered the Seminary of the College and Mission House of the Carthusians of Tardajos, two leagues from Burgos, studies that the Duchess of Sevillano paid for. Although there he discovered his little vocation, he returned to Madrid where he continued his studies at the San Dámaso Conciliar Seminary; He then had love affairs with the singer María Noel, who gave him the last name for her pseudonym. She inspired the short story Santa's Soul (1909). He was, however, still granted a scholarship by the Duchess in Mechelen (Belgium) to study with the famous Cardinal Mercier, of whom he was a disciple. Upon his return to Madrid, he briefly attended law classes.

After leaving religion, he led a life as a bohemian journalist, of republican and socialist ideology. He attended the valleinclan gathering at the Nuevo Café de Levante. In 1909 he volunteered to fight in the Melilla war. His articles on the Africa campaign in España Nueva, the republican newspaper directed by Rodrigo Soriano, were compiled in Notas de un voluntario and one of them, the first, «How a marquis and a duke live in the campaign ", earned him time in the Modelo prison; When he left there he met the Cuban Amada, who would be the passion of his life.

Eugenio Noel Tomb in the Civil Cemetery of Madrid

In 1913 he began his anti-flamenco campaign touring all of Spain, trips from which he left several chronicles written, in which he paid particular attention to social injustices. Always committed to social causes, throughout his life he maintained a stubborn campaign against flamenco and against the bullfight, which caused him not a few troubles.

He died in poverty in a rented bed in a Barcelona hospital, on April 23, 1936; When his body was sent to Madrid, he got lost in a siding in Zaragoza, was found and was buried in the Madrid civil cemetery.

Assessment

Among the recurring characterizations to which the figure of Noel has been subjected is that of "epigone of 98", with Giménez Caballero calling him "a registered trademark noventaiochista" and Andrés Trapiello affirming that "he is more than 98 than those of 98, the one who believed it more", although Noel himself would have rejected this affiliation, including himself within the Noucentistas and stating in his memoirs:

The 98 are all men who made a time [...]. They contribute to the anchilosis of the race. Intellectual without dynamism. Sentimental..

Eugenio Noel, Intimate journal.

La capea, which appeared in 1915, is, together with Las siete cucas, Noel's most republished book. In Nervos de la raza he would show his sympathy for the noventayochista ideology. Julio Cejador y Frauca describes him with the following words:

Madrileño, admirable satirizer of the Spanish lacras, flamenquism, toreo, etc., etc.; perspicacious observer, raised thinker and noble; sincere prosist, breeze, painter, loose and castizo; vividly painted the customs, especially of the malente people, up and down, and copied from the natural the talk of chulos and bullfighters.

Cedar and Frauca, 1920, p. 68

Works

• Soul of Saint (The Weekly Count, 1909).
• Notes from a volunteer outside Melilla, Madrid, 1909.
• Pan and bulls (c. 1912).
• What I saw in the war, Madrid, 1912.
• The Flamenquismo and bullfightingBilbao, 1912.
• Republic and Flemish, Madrid, 1912.
• The King has fun, Madrid, 1913.
• Scenes and walks of the anti-flamenca campaign, Madrid, 1913.
• Castles in Spain
  • Take I. The Roots of the Spanish Tragedy, Madrid, 1915.
  • Volume II. Spain the old, Madrid, 1915.
  • Volume III. La Epopeya de las capeas, Madrid, 1915.
• The hood1915.
• Race nerves1915.
• Chulos, phenomena and flamenco1916.
• Semana Santa in Seville1916.
• Life of saints, devils, martyrs, friars, clerics and souls in sorrow1916.
• Piel de España1917.
• Providence to take away, picturesque lives of phenomena, bullfighters, etc.1917.
• The Joy of Symphony VII1917.
• Value judgements1917.
• Martin the Paula in Alcalá de los Panaderos (The World Novel, 1926).
• The seven cucks. A manze in Castile (1927).
• Painful lives of phenomena, sick bullfighters, diestros and sinisters of national burial.
• Spain, nerve
• Race and soul.
• Iberian waterfuerts.
• The Hispanic Revolution.
• How the Spanish Republic has fallen into the soul of our American colonies.
• Taurus and contrasted truths.