Sex, Flippancy, Autobiography: Existential Palliatives in Valle-Inclán's Sonatas

Valle-Inclán's four Sonatas (1902-1905) have much in common with the turn-of-the-century novels of philosophical pessimism by Unamuno, Baroja, and Martínez Ruiz. The protagonist, the Marqués de Bradomín, is keenly aware of the transience of life, the effects of aging, and human mortality. At the same time, while he lacks any religious faith, he does not fall into depression or anguish. Rather, he mitigates or manages to forget these unpleasant truths by engaging in certain kinds of behaviors, and principal among these are sex, flippancy, and autobiography. His experience of sex runs the gamut from romantic infatuation to raw carnality, and it also changes significantly over the course of his life. Flippancy covers a range of attitudes and actions such as mendacity, faking, posturing, joking, levity, and wryness. Finally, as the efficacy of these two kinds of behavior wanes, the Marqués takes refuge in autobiography in a manner very reminiscent of one of his heroes, Casanova.