Novel
Fortunata and Jacinta
Fortunata y Jacinta
Benito Pérez Galdós · 1886
Opening lines
Las noticias más remotas que tengo de la persona que lleva este nombre me las ha dado Jacinto María Villalonga, y alcanzan al tiempo en que este amigo mío y el otro y el de más allá, Zalamero, Joaquinito Pez, Alejandro Miquis, iban a las aulas de la Universidad.
The earliest news I have of the person who bears this name was given to me by Jacinto María Villalonga, and it goes back to the time when this friend of mine and others besides, Zalamero, Joaquinito Pez, Alejandro Miquis, attended classes at the University.
Translation by Erostrate
Text quoted from gutenberg.org
Synopsis
Madrid, in the second half of the nineteenth century. Juanito Santa Cruz, the spoilt only son of a rich family of merchants, spends his time enjoying himself with his friends. In a working-class district, he seduces Fortunata, a young woman of the people, then tires of her and disappears, leaving her pregnant. Worried about his way of life, his mother marries him to his cousin Jacinta. During their honeymoon, he tells her about Fortunata; Jacinta forgives, but remains curious about this woman. The years pass, and Jacinta has no child.
Context
Begun in 1885, the novel appeared in four volumes, the last in 1887. It belongs to the cycle of the author's contemporary Spanish novels, in which characters reappear from one book to the next, following the method of Balzac's La Comédie humaine, and it has more than a hundred secondary characters. It was adapted for the stage in 1969, for the cinema by Angelino Fons in 1970, then for television by Mario Camus in 1980.
Who it is for
A very long novel, in four parts of unequal length, almost as long as War and Peace.
Prizes and reception
Regarded by a large part of the critics as its author's best novel and, together with La Regenta, as the most representative of Spanish realism.