La dualidad de un tiempo: vencedores y vencidos en la narrativa autobiográfica de Esther Tusquets y Maria Aurèlia Capmany

Abstract

This study focuses on what image women present about the Spanish Civil War and the Francoism through the books Mala memòria(1987) written by Maria Aurèlia Capmany and Habíamos ganado la guerra(2007) written by Esther Tusquets. These authors belonged respectively to the defeated and the winning side. The research question that has been formulated is: What image do the two authors offer from the vanquished/victors side based on their experiences during the Civil War and the Franco dictatorship? It has been chosen to show this duality by means of a tripartite theoretical part in order to show both the autobiographical/memoralistic aspects as well ass the sociohistorical aspects. This theoretical part includes the following concepts: autobiography and the construction of the self, the difference between the defeated and the victors and the concept of inner-exile. Based on these concepts an analysis of the two books has been made to show the social division during the period, the isolation, how we can witness the self in the books and also was the generic question of the books argued. The novels show the panorama of the society during the Spanish Civil War and the Francoism and the thoughts of the authors about this society. It was expected to find less division between the two sides, due to another perspective, that of the women, but in the study it is argued that this was only the case in one of the two books, since no typ of approach/understanding by Capmany has been found. Another conclusion was that the duality between the two works was clearly present and the “insilio” only manifests itself in the work of Capmany.