Peruvian politician
In this
Spanish name
, the first or paternal
surname
is
Gonzalez de Prada
and the second or maternal family name is
Ulloa
.
Jose Manuel de los Reyes Gonzalez de Prada y Ulloa
(Lima, January 5, 1844 – Lima, July 22, 1918) was a
Peruvian
politician and
anarchist
,
literary critic
and director of the
National Library of Peru
. The first writer to criticize the
oligarchy
within Peru,
[1]
he is well remembered as a social critic who helped develop
Peruvian
intellectual thought in the early twentieth century, as well as the academic style known as
modernismo
.
He was born into the aristocratic class.
[2]
He was close in spirit to
Clorinda Matto de Turner
whose first novel,
Torn from the Nest
approached political
indigenismo
, and to
Mercedes Cabello de Carbonera
, who like Gonzalez Prada, practiced a
positivism
sui generis.
Early life
[
edit
]
Gonzalez Prada was born on January 5, 1844, in
Lima
to a wealthy, conservative,
aristocratic
Spanish family.
[1]
[3]
[2]
His father was the judge and politician Francisco Gonzalez de Prada Marron y Lombrera, who served as Member of the Superior Court of Justice of Lima and Mayor of Lima. His mother was Maria Josefa Alvarez de Ulloa y Rodriguez de la Rosa. His grandfather was an important administrative figure in the
Viceroyalty of Peru
.
[2]
Due to the political exile of his father, the family temporarily settled down in
Valpariso
, where he started his education at an English school. During his youth, Gonzalez Prada would remove the "de" portion of his name in repudiation of his family's aristocratic background.
[3]
Upon returning to Peru, his father was elected
Mayor of Lima
in 1857 and he continued his studies at the Seminary of Santo Toribio. Prada abandoned Santo Toribio and enrolled the liberal
San Carlos Convictorium
, where he studied law and letters.
He would go on to live much of his life in Lima, living in a city full of Spanish traditions and
conservatism
, though he would become estranged from much of his family.
[3]
Biography
[
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]
Travel in south, solitude
[
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]
For a period of time, Gonzalez Prada traveled through Southern Peru, especially near
Cerro de Pasco
, where he met with peasants and some of the
indigenous peoples of Peru
, developing an opposition to
centralismo
in Lima.
[2]
Following the death of his father in 1863, Gonzalez Prada would live in the Tutumo
hacienda
of his family until 1869.
[2]
During this period of solitude, he would experiment with a chemistry lab, developing a profitable starch compound, became a more improved poet and received political literature from Europe that would influence him.
[2]
War of the Pacific
[
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]
In 1879, he would release
Cuartos de hora
just prior to Chile's invasion of Peru, attacking the ruling class and Catholic Church.
[4]
During Peru's impending defeat by
Chile
in the
War of the Pacific
, Gonzalez Prada would stay in his home for three years, refusing to look at
the foreign invaders occupying Peru
.
[1]
[2]
The conflict proved to him that Peru was a failure under the economic oligarchy and that large reforms were necessary to improve the nation.
[1]
He would identify businessmen, clergy, military leaders and politicians as the upper class, saying that their wealth and power was gained through
crony capitalism
.
[1]
Gonzalez Prada saw the political elites in two fashions; the civilian elite who stole public funds through
special interest groups
and the militaristic
caudillos
who plundered state coffers blatantly.
[1]
To enforce this system, he said that the elites utilized
political repression
through the police and military.
[1]
Culturally, he said the elites were foreign to the majority of Peruvians since they adopted Spanish customs and continued colonial practices, including
feudalism
, continuing
inequality and poor development in rural areas
.
[1]
Literary Circle
[
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]
He was an original partner in the
Lima Literary Club
and he participated in the foundation of the
Peruvian Literary Circle
, a vehicle to propose a literature based on science and the future.
[5]
The Literary Circle saw themselves as
freethinkers
and that they were destined to change Peru, reaching out to Gonzalez Prada, who immediately reoriented the groups direction.
[2]
[5]
During his first address to the group at the Ateneo, he would criticize those who looked to the past, stating "Our liberty will be useless if we limit ourselves in torm to the exaggerated purism of Madrid, or if in substance we submit ourselves to the Syllabus of Rome. Let us rid ourselves of the tendency that induces us to prefer the foliage of words to the fruit of ideas."
[5]
In 1886, he became the head of the Literary Circle, stating:
[2]
I see myself, from this day on, at the head of a group destined to become the radical party of our literature.
During
Fiestas Patrias
on 28 July 1888, Gonzalez Prada's
Speech at the Politeama
, read by an Ecuadorian orator due to the writer's
stage fright
, received thunderous applause by the audience, with
President of Peru
Andres Avelino Caceres
, who was in attendance, saying "l did not know whether to arrest him or embrace him".
[5]
The publication of the speech was unsuccessfully censored by the Caceres government.
[2]
His most famous book,
Free Pages
, caused a public outcry that brought Gonzalez Prada dangerously close to
excommunication
from the
Catholic Church
. His mother, a devout Catholic, died in 1888 and his criticism became more vitriolic afterwards. He said the Church "preached the sermon on the mount and practiced the morals of Judas." In fact Gonzalez Prada was part of a group of social reformers that included
Ricardo Palma
,
Juana Manuela Gorriti
,
Clorinda Matto de Turner
and
Mercedes Cabello de Carbonera
. These important authors were concerned with the enduring influence of
Spanish colonialism
in Peru. Gonzalez Prada was perhaps the most radical of them all. The most radical work he published during his lifetime was
Hours of Battle
, translated as
Hard Times
.
National Union
[
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]
In political life, Gonzalez Prada was initially a member of the
Civilista Party
, but left to found with his friends, a radical party known as the
National Union
, a party of "propaganda and attack." The Literary Circle was transformed into National Union in 1891.
[2]
Gonzalez Prada was named as a presidential candidate, but had to flee to
Europe
following
persecution
. He would spend seven years in Europe, visiting France and Spain, finally returning to Peru in May 1898.
[2]
Upon his return, he called for
social revolution
and the "greatest liberty" be brought through social reform.
[2]
He stood as his party's Presidential Candidate in the
Presidential election of 1899
and came in third with 0.95% of the vote, with aristocrat
Eduardo Lopez de Romana
receiving 97% of the vote. Following the presidential election, he was asked to work for the newly formed government.
In 1902, Gonzalez Prada would leave National Union and instead chose to write for working-class newspapers.
[2]
He began writing for
Los Parias
, a Peruvian anarchist newspaper, in 1904.
[2]
He also took up the post of director of the
National Library of Peru
on
Abancay Avenue
and helped to improve and reorganise the library to one of international stature.
Later life
[
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]
His books
Minusculas
(1901) and
Exoticas
(1911) are often considered as
modernista
although his work transcends the scope of that movement. Some critics have suggested that his poetry is
pre-proletarian
.
Baladas peruanas
(1935), perhaps his best book, is a vindication of the Indian. His metrical and rhythmical innovations and experiments are remarkable in Spanish-American poetry.
Horas de lucha
(1908) is a good example of his prose.
[6]
Until his death, Gonzalez Prada dedicated himself to educating university students and workers, holding
Luz y Amor
(Light and Love) discussion groups and sharing his writings with them.
[2]
Gonzalez Prada died of
cardiac arrest
on 22 July 1918 and was buried in the
Cementerio Presbitero Matias Maestro
as a Peruvian
patriot
.
[7]
His writings on
Anarchism
,
Anarquia
, was posthumously released in 1936.
[8]
Political views
[
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]
Upon returning to Peru from Europe in 1898, Gonzalez Prada would support
anarchism
, believing it provided more liberty compared to
liberalism
, which had prevented reform in Peru.
[2]
He had similar anarchist thoughts as
Pierre-Joseph Proudhon
and
Bakunin
. An atheist, a follower of
Darwin
,
Spencer
, and
Comte
, Manuel Gonzalez Prada was a powerful
polemicist
whose targets were the Catholic Church, the Spanish tradition, and, generally, any form of conservatism. He would describe anarchism as "a new Christianity ... without Christ" and that it would provide "unlimited freedom and the greatest well-being for the individual with the abolition of the state and private property".
[2]
Gonzalez Prada did not see the crisis facing Peru as a
class conflict
, saying that one class achieving power over the other would only mimic actual
social justice
.
[2]
When giving the "
El intelectual y el obrero
" address to the anarchist group Federacion de Obreros Panaderos during a
International Workers' Day
event in 1905, he would make the cautioning statement that "revolutions come from above, but are made operative from below ... every revolution once successful tends to become a government of force, every victorious revolutionary degenerates into a conservative".
[2]
After seeing the failures of nationalism, his strong
moral values
and after embracing anarchism, Gonzalez Prada concluded:
[2]
"Given the general inclination of man to abuse power, all government is evil and all authority means tyranny."
Legacy
[
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]
The legacy of Gonzalez Prada would not be recognized until later into the 20th century, influencing
progressive
movements within Peru.
[3]
His writings would also influence
indigenismo
due to his criticism of the pervasive Spanish culture amongst the Peruvian elite.
[1]
Linguistics scholar Bohdan Plaskacz would describe Gonzalez Prada "as one of the greatest essayists of Latin America, champion of the rights of Peruvian Indians and spiritual father of the socialist movement of the following generation".
[9]
Peruvian intellectuals influenced by Gonzalez Prada include
Jose Carlos Mariategui
and
Victor Raul Haya de la Torre
.
[1]
Victor Andres Belaunde
was influenced by Gonzalez Prada's description of a superficial elite class.
[1]
His intellectual and stylistic footprint can be found in the writing of
Clorinda Matto de Turner
,
Mercedes Cabello de Carbonera
,
Jose Santos Chocano
,
Aurora Caceres
,
Cesar Vallejo
,
Jose Carlos Mariategui
and
Mario Vargas Llosa
.
Following a curriculum change in the 1960s for the studies of the
Peruvian Armed Forces
, military students were taught the writings of Gonzalez Prada and became disillusioned with the political elite, with officers ultimately overthrowing the government of
Fernando Belaunde
in
1968 Peruvian coup d'etat
due to concerns of inequality.
[1]
Thomas Ward, director of the Latin American and Latino Studies at
Loyola University Maryland
, would say of Gonzalez Prada:
[10]
"[E]ach century can boast of a voice that sounds in the desert shouting against colonialism, the corrupt, and its accomplices. ... A voice that, from the ruins of the
War of the Pacific
, ... rose up against pusillanimity, against the lack of principles, the
Creole
concept of Peru excluding the Andean, was that of Manuel Gonzalez Prada."
Besides being a philosopher and a significant political agitator, Gonzalez Prada is important as the first Latin American author to write in a style known as
modernismo
(modernista in Spanish, different from Anglo-American
modernism
) poet in Peru, anticipating some of the literary innovations that
Ruben Dario
would shortly bring to the entire Hispanic world. He also introduced new devices such as the triolet, rondel and Malayan pantun which revitalized Spanish verse. Besides his poetry, he cultivated the essay, and most recently
Isabelle Tauzin Castellanos
has published some of his hitherto unknown fiction.
References
[
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]
- ^
a
b
c
d
e
f
g
h
i
j
k
l
Gorman, Stephen M. (September 1980). "The Economic and Social Foundations of Elite Power in Peru: A Review of the Literature".
Social and Economic Studies
.
29
(2/3).
University of the West Indies
: 292?319.
- ^
a
b
c
d
e
f
g
h
i
j
k
l
m
n
o
p
q
r
s
t
u
Chavarria, Jesus (1 May 1970). "The Intellectuals and the Crisis of Modern Peruvian Nationalism: 1870-1919".
Hispanic American Historical Review
.
50
(2): 257?278.
- ^
a
b
c
d
Mead, Jr., Robert G. (September 1953). "Manuel Gonzalez Prada: Peruvian Judge of Spain".
Publications of the Modern Language Association of America
.
68
(4): 696?715.
- ^
Chavarria, Jesus (1 May 1970). "The Intellectuals and the Crisis of Modern Peruvian Nationalism: 1870-1919".
Hispanic American Historical Review
.
50
(2): 257?278.
- ^
a
b
c
d
Gillis, James A. (1967).
Gonzalez Prada: His Ideas and Influence
.
Loyola University Chicago
. p. 17.
- ^
THE PENGUIN POETS LATIN-AMERICAN VERSE, edited by Enrique Caracciolo-Trejo
- ^
"¿Que personajes historicos estan enterrados en el Presbitero Maestro?"
.
infobae
(in European Spanish). 19 July 2022
. Retrieved
3 May
2023
.
- ^
Books Abroad
Volume 14 - Page 12 Roy Temple House, Ernst Erich Noth - 1940 "As for his ideology, Anarquia is a formidable arraignment of the Creole oligarchies and a plea for anarchism, which was the position of the Peruvian Left at that time. "
- ^
Plaskacz, Bohdan (1970). "Manuel Gonzalez Prada and Prince Peter Kropotkin ? Aristocrats Turned Anarchists".
Slavic and East-European Studies
.
15
: 83?92.
- ^
Gonzalez Prada, Manuel (2021).
Anarquia
(Primeraicion ed.). Miraflores, Lima, Peru: Revuelta Editores. pp. 7?10.
ISBN
9786124824753
.
- Gonzalez Prada, Manuel,
Free Pages and Hard Times: Anarchist Musings
. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003.
ISBN
0-19-511687-9
(hardcover) and
ISBN
0-19-511688-7
(paperback).
- Gonzalez Prada, Manuel, "The Slaves of the Church". Trans. Cathleen Carris.
PMLA
128.3 (May 2013): 765-777.
Secondary bibliography
[
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]
- Rufino Blanco Fombona,
Grandes escritores de America
, Madrid, 1917.
- Eugenio Chang-Rodriguez,
La literatura politica: De Gonzalez Prada, Mariategui y Haya de la Torre
, Mexico, 1957, esp. pp. 51?125.
- John A. Crow, "The Epic of Latin America," Fourth Edition, pp. 636?639.
- Joel Delhom, "Ambiguites de la question raciale dans les essais de Manuel Gonzalez Prada", en
Les noirs et le discours identitaire latinoamericain
, Perpignan, 1997: 13-39.
- Efrain Kristal,
Una vision urbana de los Andes: genesis y desarrollo del indigenismo en el Peru, 1848-1930
, Lima, 1991.
- Robert G. Mead, Jr.,
Perspectivas interamericanas: literatura y libertad
, New York, 1967, esp. pp. 103?184.
- Eduardo Muratta Bunsen, "El pensamiento filosofico de don Manuel Gonzalez Prada," en
Filosofia y sociedad en el Peru
, Lima, 2003: 128-143.
- Luis Alberto Sanchez,
Nuestras vidas son los rios…historia y leyenda de los Gonzalez Prada
, Lima, 1977.
- Isabelle Tauzin-Castellanos, ed.,
Manuel Gonzalez Prada: escritor de dos mundos
, Lima, 2006.
- Marcel Velazquez Castro,
Las mascaras de la representacion: el sujeto esclavista y las rutas del racismo en el Peru (1775-1895)
, Lima, 2005, esp. pp. 249?264.
- Thomas Ward,
La anarquia inmanentista de Manuel Gonzalez Prada
. New York, 1998.
- Thomas Ward, “Gonzalez Prada: sonador indigenista de la nacion”, en su
Resistencia cultural: La nacion en el ensayo de las Americas
, Lima, 2004: 160-177.
- Thomas Ward, “Manuel Gonzalez Prada vs. Rigoberta Menchu: When
Indigenismo
meets Indigenous Thought.”
Hispania
95.3 (September 2012): 400-423.
- Thomas Ward, ed,
El porvenir nos debe una Victoria. La insolita modernidad de Manuel Gonzalez Prada
. Lima, 2010.
External links
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