Nowy człowiek Miguela de Unamuno. Nuevo Mundo

Abstract

This text presents the vision of the new man in the first novel written by the Spanish writer Miguel de Unamuno (1864–1936), but not published until 1994. Contrary to the dominant critical approaches that mine Unamuno’s novel for answers to biographical questions, the author shows the connections between Nuevo Mundo and symbolist discourse. The novel’s protagonist oscillates between mysticism and anarchism. His renewal occurs in the religious (the coming of the new Christ and breaking with petrified dogmas) and social (rejecting ideologies in favor of contemplation of the meaning of life) dimensions. Unamuno renders theses concepts through references to the Pre-Raphaelite aesthetic and the early Renaissance painting of Fra Angelico. In keeping with the canon of the symbolist novel, Unamuno’s new man suffers defeat in the face of reality.