Short but sweet: Javier Marías' estimable author
vignettes display his considerable abilities
The other day, a rather beautiful little book dropped onto my desk. Written Lives is a short collection of potted biographies of famous writers by the Spanish novelist and essayist Javier Marías. Ranging from Faulkner to Nabokov, Joyce to Rimbaud, each life story is no more than 10 or so pages, concentrating on a particular period or aspect of the subject's life. Thus we find Oscar Wilde bloated and listless in his life after prison, and a posturing James Joyce comparing "the mystery of Mass" with his own work. Each piece mixes a little anecdote, some biographical fact and a brief explanation of the chosen writer's greatness.
First written in 1992, Written Lives has been translated by Marías' long-time collaborator Margaret Jull Costa, and mixes the author's skills as both fictionalist and journalist. The stories are particularly enlightening when Marías highlights a writer's peculiar foible or telling characteristic. Apparently Joseph "Conrad was so irritable that whenever he dropped his pen, instead of picking it up at once and carrying on writing, he would spend several minutes exasperatedly drumming his fingers on the desk as if bemoaning what had occurred." And Wilde had a handshake so limp and flabby, it "left one with a sense of having been sullied by shaking it".
As Marías says, "the idea ... was to treat these well-known literary figures as if they were fictional characters, which may well be how all writers, whether famous or obscure, would secretly like to be treated".
Marías himself has long lived in a world of great writers, especially wise old men who have served as mentors to him, and who crop up throughout his numerous novels and essays. But there is one who surely influenced him more than any other, and whose life itself is worthy of biography. His father, Julián, who died last week at the age of 91, was - just as his son has become - a great man of Spanish letters.
A disciple of the renowned philosopher Ortega y Gasset, an historian of philosophy, academic, teacher and the author of over 60 books, Julián Marías lived an exemplary life in Spain's tumultuous early- and mid-20th century. An old-fashioned liberal, he joined the Republican cause in opposition to Franco's fascistic regime. Once Franco had taken power in 1936, some writers chose to hunker down, cause no fuss and hope for advancement, while Marías Sr's career was challenged and thwarted at every turn. He stood up for what he believed in, and as a result was subsequently denounced by a supposed friend to the Franco regime. He was arrested and spent some time in prison, where he was lucky to escape the firing squad. The philistine fascist dictatorship then organised that his doctoral thesis be suspended, preventing him from achieving the status at the university in Madrid that his talents merited. Though he was not officially exiled, the demands of a growing family forced him abroad to the United States, where he taught with great success at Harvard, Yale, UCLA, and a number of other colleges.
Despite these setbacks, Marías produced a book in 1941, at the age of just 26, that is still considered one of the classic introductions to western philosophy written in the 20th century. All Spanish-speaking philosophy students will know his History of Philosophy, as they do in the United States. He also wrote widely on topics as diverse as Cervantes, metaphysics, religion and Spain, though never quite gaining the credit he deserved.
On the occasion of Julián's 80th birthday in 1994, Javier wrote a piece in El Pais newspaper simply entitled The father. It's a moving testimony to his father's boundless energy and spirit and a rejection of all the attacks he had to endure; as when he was recommended for the Royal Academy of the Spanish Language - Franco could only say: "He is an enemy of the regime, but I can do nothing. We do not have direct control over the Academy." In the piece, the son clearly regrets having to defend the father in public, but feels that there are things that need to be said.
Friends and former colleagues also paid moving tribute to Marías following his death. Emilio Lledó, philosopher and historian of philosophy, told El Pais that, "nobody had his clarity of ideas ... none of the philosophy teachers could compare with him". Even the King of Spain phoned Javier to pass on his condolences.
Though Julián Marías has died, he has left a vital inheritance in Javier. He is, at 54, at the peak of his powers and has earned an ever-growing band of followers around the world. The New Yorker recently profiled him, his work is being translated into more and more languages, and his articles in the Spanish press on matters mundane and mundial, delight millions of readers. He is currently writing the final part of an acclaimed trilogy, Your Face Tomorrow, (the second volume of which contains many stories from his father's life) and he is surely in line for a future Nobel Prize. Marías Sr may not have been fully appreciated during his lifetime, but he lives on in his son.
