Constructing and Resisting Modernity: Madrid 1900–1936, and: Construyendo la modernidad: Escritura y arquitectura en el Madrid moderno (1918–1937) (review)

The publication of these two recent books—both on the topics of modernity, cultural production, and Madrid’s built environment, and both focusing on cultural production in early twentieth-century Spain—cannot but draw our attention to the existence of changes that have long been brewing in the field. Over the years there have been, of course, a number of moments in which the discipline of Hispanism has been forced to reassess its intentions; forced, that is, to carry on a conversation regarding what defines the scope of its practice, or what is the nature of its method. It has often proven difficult to reach a disciplinary consensus on such issues. Regarding questions of scope and method, there may no longer be (there may never have been) one single notion of Hispanism, but rather many coexisting, overlapping, and contradictory notions. There is no doubt that these strikingly original books by Susan Larson and Carlos Ramos form part of a concerted attempt to redefine the field—by prioritizing the modern city and folding cultural production into that new vision of the urban experience.

Despite the fact that these are not the first books or studies to grapple with urban modernity in Spain, they are nonetheless badly needed contributions to a configuration of Hispanism that may seem to many traditionally minded critics to be either too daunting or too interdisciplinary—in either case requiring knowledge that has often been seen as peripheral to the discipline’s literary core. Nonetheless, even more traditional readers will surely find these books to be wonderfully and unquestioningly literary. Make no mistake, Larson and Ramos consciously build on an existing corpus of work on the city and the Spanish urban experience. Each cites a common list of previous urban-themed publications by Cristián Ricci (El espacio urbano del Madrid en la narrativa de la Edad de Plata (1900–1938) [2009]), Michael Ugarte (Madrid 1900 [1996]), Edward Baker (Materiales para escribir Madrid [1991]), Carlos Sambricio (Madrid, urbanismo y gestión municipal [1984]), Aurora Fernández Polanco (Urbanismo en Madrid durante la II República 1931–1939 [1990]), among others. And yet, in each case, they remain critics who have great respect for literature and literary analysis—even as they sustain enviable interdisciplinary conversations. To wit: Larson’s book devotes entire chapters to authors Carmen de Burgos (chapter 3, 69–105), José Díaz Fernández (chapter 4, 107–41), and Andrés Carranque de Ríos (chapter 5, 143–71) as grounded in a notion of modernity derived from such figures as Henri Lefebvre, Marshall Berman, and, above all else, David Harvey; and, Ramos’s text traces the “polinización entre artes diversas” (17; emphasis mine, see also 97, 123), effecting the collision of art and architecture through explorations of authors and architectural thinkers alike: José Moreno Villa (chapter 4, 97–112), Vicente Huidobro (chapter 5, 113–30), Ernesto Giménez Caballero (chapter 6, 131–46), and Fernando García Mercadal (chapter 7, 147–66). This he does within a framework that draws on the likes of Baudrillard, Benjamin, Eco, and more, as a way of emphasizing the intimate relationship between aesthetic questions and material matters. As this review discusses not one book but rather two—both readable yet sophisticated texts that clearly intersect with and diverge from one another in numerous ways despite their similarly worded titles—I will not attempt to provide a totalizing look inside both, but rather a comparative perspective outlining in broad terms their contributions, method(s), and visions of urban modernity.

In a sense, Larson’s Constructing and Resisting Modernity is perhaps the more radical of the two books. As she puts it in what is effectively a call for Hispanic Studies to embrace a Cultural...