COLOR SYMBOLISM IN SELECTED NOVELS OF VICENTE BLASCO IBANEZ

by

JEFFREY THOMAS OXFORD, B.A.

A THESIS

IN

SPANISH

Submitted to the Graduate Faculty of Texas Tech University in

Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for

the Degree of

MASTER OF ARTS

Approved

Accepted

December 1989

Ac

Copyright 1989 Jeffrey Thomas Oxford

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I would like to express my gratitude and most

profound appreciation to not only my committee members,

but especially to Dr. Wendell McClendon. Without his

help and being an ear, as well as sounding-board on color

symbolism, this would have been immensely more difficult.

11

CONTENTS

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS i i

LIST OF TABLES iv

CHAPTER

I. HISTORICAL AND LITERARY LIFE OF VICENTE BLASCO

IBANEZ 1

II. CRITICAL ANALYSIS OF BLASCO IBANEZ 14

III. APPROACH AND DEFINITIONS 27

IV. COLOR ANALYSIS OF SANGRE Y ARENA 34

V. COLOR ANALYSIS OF LOS CUATRO JINETES DEL

APOCALIPSIS 60

CONCLUSION 85

WORKS CITED 90

111

LIST OF TABLES

Table 1:

Table 2:

Table 3:

Table 4:

Color Analysis of Sanqre v arena

Color Analysis of Sanqre v arena; Juan Colorization

Color Analysis of Los cuatro iinetes del Appealipsis

Color Analysis of Los cuatro iinetes del Appealipsis; Characterization Coloring

57

58

82

83

IV

CHAPTER I

HISTORICAL AND LITERARY LIFE OF

VICENTE BLASCO IBANEZ

The study of almost any author raises questions con­

cerning the literary period during which the author wrote,

the genre of his principal works, themes and techniques

employed, and personal historical data relevant to the

author's writings, as well as, the author's native or

adopted country and language.

One author for whom all of this is of utmost im­

portance due to the vast amount of his publications and

thematic subject matter is Vicente Blasco Ibanez. When

considering this late nineteenth century and early twen­

tieth century peninsular Spanish author's life, generally

one thinks first of his latter years in which he possessed

great wealth as well as substantial fame. However, he did

suffer during his early years many of life's pains and

hard knocks portrayed in his works, and he had personal

experience dealing with many of the problems and sadnesses

of his fictional characters.

Blasco Ibanez, who scrawled his maternal last name

along with his surname in his signature "pour que I'on ne

fut pas tente d'attribuer a d'autres [specifically signi­

fying Eusebio Blasco—another Spanish author of the

V

nineteenth century] qu'a lui les productions de sa

plume,"^ was born on January 29, 1867. His parents were

Caspar Blasco and Ramona Ibanez, both Aragonese, whose

families had moved, due to economical reasons, to Valencia

in which city the two later met and married, and where

Vicente was born. The child started school at four and

progressed rapidly, but due to his restless and individ­

ualistic nature he was isolated and solitary. It was

during this self-sufficient childhood that he developed a

fondness for reading which stayed with him even into his

adulthood: "II ne se passe pas de jour qu'il ne consacre

de trois a quatre heures a la lecture" (Pitollet 9). But

his mother, a very pious person, did not approve of his

voracious reading of non-religious material, and, thus,

he was compelled to hide those highly beloved novels.

In 1876 Vicente met Francisco Verge, a schoolmate his

own age with whom he became good friends and accompanied

in skipping school. Probably due to this, at least in

part, Vicente had a less than perfect performance in his

classes, encountered scholastic problems, and was obliged

to give up his dreams of becoming a sailor; that is, "poco

a poco fue desistiendo ante el problema insuperable de las

matematicas, del algebra."^ His mother had always wanted

him to be a priest, and continued her insistence, but he

refused. Then when academics did force a change of plans.

he switched to the study of law, in 1882, partially as a

conciliatory move toward his parents. He soon thereafter

became known at the Universidad de Valencia for his

outspoken viewpoints, and began to attend the student

tertulias. However, his disapproving mother soon forbade

even his going out at night. But Vicente was not to be

outdone; he rebelliously took to slipping out the window,

"pero su madre siempre acaba por descubrirle" (Iglesias

23).

Finding such a controlled life quite unbearable, this

sixteen-year old left home and escaped to Madrid in Decem­

ber of 1883 in order to find his freedom and fortune as a

writer. As no editor would publish his works due to his

age, he was forced to become a secretary to Manuel

Fernandez y Gonzalez—another formerly famous Spanish

nineteenth century author. It is under his tutelage where

Vicente learned many of his skills and developed his

artistic talents by writing, taking dictation, and

editing.

But his material existence was not very easy then;

young Vicente lived an almost picaresque life, his mentor

inviting "a cenar a Blasco—unico pago que recibe por su

labor" (Iglesias 24). On the other hand, his future

career was aided: "He [Vicente] learned from him [Fer­

nandez y Gonzalez] the techniques of rapid composition.

forceful description of people and their customs, and ways

of achieving suspense and keeping the reader's interest on

every page."^ Suspense, reader's interest, and a pica­

resque life, however, were not what Vicente's mother

wanted for her adolescent son; consequently, she went to

the police in order to find him. This they did; they

detained him, and on February 2, 1884, Vicente was com­

pelled to return with his mother to Valencia.

With this, the closing of the most important develop­

mental chapter of his life, Blasco Ibanez found himself

again in a confined environment studying to be a lawyer.

He completed his work, received the degree in 1888, and

decided to continue his first love and work as a writer.

Forced to flee to France only a short while later due to

his leading demonstrations promoting his pro-republican

political persuasions, he met Manuel Ruiz Zorrilla. For

the next twenty years he spent time in Spain, France, and

Italy propagating his "heretical," and certainly comprome-

tidas views, alternately fleeing governmental persecution

and serving in the Spanish government as an elected repre­

sentative. He endured several months of incarceration for

his actions, but his radicalism was more dangerous "en los

metodos que en su doctrina"^. he was "un activista en la

plena acepcion de la palabra" (Conte 510). It was also

during this time that his activism carried him to the

point of being involved in a duel at least three times,

possibly more: "II soutint aussi de frequents duels avec

ses adversaires politiques" (Pitollet 51), none of which

had serious ramifications.

In 1909 Blasco traveled to Argentina in order to

escape the pressures and built-up tension deriving from

his active and controversial life-style. He founded two

agricultural colonies, but these failed due to hard eco­

nomic times, so he rededicated himself to his writings.

He had opposed the Spanish-American War, stating that the

Cubans deserved independence; consequently, in World War I

he favored the more liberal element, and was an activist

for the Allies. In 1919-1920, he visited the U.S.A.,

Mexico and Cuba, receiving an honorary doctorate at the

University of Washington and signing contracts for the

filming of certain of his works. In 1923-1924, Blasco

took a six-month trip around the world after which he

returned to his home, Fontana Rosa, in France, where he

died on January 28, 1928.

But his life story doesn't end with his death for

even today there are differing opinions, and animated ar­

guments, concerning his life-style and writings. To some

authorities his writings are quite agreeable, and these

critics find him worthy of note. Others despise him per­

sonally or ideologically, and consequently they have the

same feelings for his writings. But whether one per­

sonally likes him or not, and no matter how long the

arguments endure, one thing remains constant: his wri­

tings are definitely divided into groups.^ Although

critics have divided his total literary writings, which

are primarily novels and short stories, into groups

numbering from three to ten, for the purposes of this

paper the divisions of his more often cultivated genre—

the novel—will number five, the figure which seems to be

most often used by critics.

Blasco Ibanez's best period of writing, according to

many critics, was his earliest, or the turn-of-the-century

period during which he wrote regional novels, that is,

novels about Valencia, his native area and the region of

Spain that he knew best. Included in this group, among

others, are Flor de Mavo (1895), Canas v barro (1902), and

the novel which originally was written as a short story,

later amplified, and is now considered by many as his mas­

terpiece. La barraca (1898). He surpasses in artistic

aesthetic qualities many other regional authors not only

due to his descriptive ability but also, and more speci­

fically, because "no adula al pueblo. Al contrario,

expone su ignorancia, vicios y brutalidades junto con sus

buenas cualidades."^ In addition, all of these regional

novels contain "the hard edge of bitterness and personal

suffering" (Ward 66) showing with an overabundance of

examples that "Blasco era un amante de la naturaleza en

bruto y sus descripciones son mas dinamicas que estati-

cas."'7

Blasco Ibanez's thesis novels comprise the second di­

vision of his works. These include La catedral. El in-

truso. La bodega and La horda (1903-05). These works are

less valuable for their descriptive content which is

often sacrificed due to obsessions with their respective

ideological themes. Indeed, these titles are classified

by some critics as works of social protest. It is true

that their shock value comes from their exposing and

condemning the injustices to the poor committed by the

Church—as portrayed in the first two—and by the

industries—in the latter two.

These propagandizing novels are followed by four psy­

chological novels: La maia desnuda (1906), Sanqre v

arena (1908), Los muertos mandan (1908) and Luna Benamor

(1909). The most important of these is Sanqre v arena.

The fourth division of novels comprises the so-called

American novels, particularily Los Arqonautas (1914) and

La tierra de todos (1922). As may be observed by the

dates of these two works, expansion and completion of this

group was hindered due to the author's inability to firmly

establish himself in this vein. In fact, this group was

8

truncated by the more ample thematic and ideological op­

portunities provided by World War I.

Novels of World War I, comprising the fifth group,

are termed the cosmopolitan novel series by many critics.

This phase was initiated in 1916 with Los cuatro iinetes

del Apocalipsis, the first of Blasco Ibanez's three novels

about the "Great War." This group later expanded, en­

tailing historical novels in the latter part. However,

Blasco lacked time to properly develop or complete another

independent group as it was this fifth division which he

was writing at his death in 1928.

In addition to the five groups of novels, Blasco Iba­

nez • s short stories, too, are worthy of note. Perhaps

they should be divided into two subsets, but they shall

not be, primarily due to their particular inherent artis­

tic qualities and descriptive capabilities. The major

productions of Blasco's brief fiction come from two dif­

ferent time periods of his life. In the first period—

up to, and including, 1896—he dedicated himself to the

writing of short stories almost exclusively, while in the

second—his latter years—he also happened to produce a

few novels as well. Like his novels, his short stories

are "finest when most deeply engaged in regional social

problems and psychology" (Ward 67). He wrote two meri­

torious collections during his early years: Cuentos

valencianos (1893) and La condenada v otros cuentos

(1896). But his short story writing ability was cur­

tailed during his latter years, 1921-1927, by his

repeated production of novels, and his four latter

collections are of lesser literary value.

In conclusion, this Spanish author who earned mil­

lions from his works lived almost sixty-one years. He

dealt literarily with many themes, was.an advocate for the

poor, favored a republican form of government in Spain,

wrote novels and short stories, was a journalist, not only

during the time while writing the regional novels, but

also during World War I, and even wrote one drama which

was performed only once on May 12, 1894.^ He died very

wealthy and was buried in Mentone, France "in earth sent

from Spain, because he did not want his body to be sent

back to Spain as long as it was a monarchy."^ However,

this honor—burial in his native country—was finally be­

stowed upon him when his remains were moved to Valencia

in 1933 after the downfall of the royalist government

which Vicente had fought all of his life to replace.

But Blasco Ibanez was denied other honors, even after

his death. His name was seldom mentioned, and even less

appreciated, among early twentieth-century Spanish cri­

tics. Perhaps due to jealousy caused by the international

fame and subsequent earnings which he received, the

10

tendency toward rejecting him was very common. However,

not all of the blame for this lack of merited attention

can be placed on others' jealousy; Blasco Ibanez himself

certainly provoked discrimination through controversial

actions which were quite unacceptable to the government

and could be construed as egocentrical.

Other self-centered personality traits also con­

tribute to putting him in a bad light. One of these is

related to the modern researcher by a one-time friend of

Blasco Ibanez, Jose Maria Carretero—"El Caballero Audaz."

He writes that once at a dinner, news was brought that a

certain Spanish artist had just died, and Blasco Ibanez

"se deleito en referirnos sus aventuras amorosas con

aquella dama ilustre. . . narrando. . . los mas intimos

escarceos con todo lujo de detalles. "-̂ ^ Other critics

maintain that he wanted to overthrow the monarchy in order

to be President himself. Carretero even quotes him as

saying: "Antes de un mes [after the revolution] sere

Presidente de la Republica" (Carretero 50).

But neither of the above elements constitutes a suf­

ficient reason for the ostracization of this literary

great in his day, nor in the present day. Certainly other

writers of the time propogated egocentrical viewpoints,

while some of the same time period had political aspira­

tions. Perhaps the margination of Blasco Ibanez is due to

11

a combination of reasons, but whatever the explanation may

be, the fact still remains that Blasco Ibanez received

more objective treatment from foreign critics than from

those in Spain.

12

Notes

Camille Pitollet, Blasco Ibanez, ses romans et le roman de sa vie (Paris: Calmann-Levy, 1921), 20.

2

3

Concepcion Iglesias, Blasco Ibanez: Un novelista para el mundo (Spain: Silex, 1985), 22.

Phillip Ward, ed. The Oxford Companion to Spanish Lit­erature (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1978), 66.

^ Rafael Conte, "Vicente Blasco Ibanez: Lecciones de un centenario," Cuadernos Hispanoamericanos No. 216 (1967), 512.

5 Even superficial research will indicate this as George Northup gives him three groups in An Introduction to Spanish Literature (Chicago: 1960), Manuel de Montolui calls these four stages in Literatura castellana (Bar­celona: 1929), Philip Ward, editor of The Oxford Com­panion to Spanish Literature (Oxford: 1978) accepts the six-period division, and Federico Carlos Sainz de Robles draws up and specifically details ten groups in La novela espanola en el siqlo XX (Madrid: 1957). Gonzalo Torrente Ballester, in Literatura espanola contemporanea (Madrid: 1949), states that "(s)u obra literaria comprende un crecido numero de novelas en las que, si no por el estilo, a lo menos por su tematica puede establecerse una clasificacion" (179), and he goes on to name the novels which comprise his six groups.

^ Smith, Paul, Vicente Blasco Ibanez; Una nueva introduc-cion a su vida v obra (Santiago de Chile; Andres Bello, 1972), 19.

^ Suarez, Bernardo. "La creacion artistica en «La barra-ca» de Blasco Ibanez," Cuadernos Hispanoamericanos No. 371 (1981), 375.

S See Paul Smith's article; "Blasco Ibanez and Drama." Hispanofila 16 (1972), 35-40. As Smith notes, Blasco Ibanez learned of the death of his mother during the estreno of the play and cancelled all remaining per­formances, never to write strictly for the theater again. However, as Iglesias points out in Blasco Ibanez; Un novelista para el mundo, at least seven of his other works have been adapted to that art form.

13

^ "Blasco Ibanez, Vicente" World Book Encyclopedia (Chicago: Field Enterprises, 1958).

^^ Maria Carretero, Jose, El novelista que vendio a su pa-tria (Madrid: Renacimiento, 1924), 44.

CHAPTER II

CRITICAL ANALYSIS OF BLASCO IBANEZ

Through frequent allusion to Blasco Ibanez's not

"attaining a significant place in modern Spanish lit­

erature, "^ the conservative, and often politically

motivated, critical establishment has contested his

importance in an attempt to negate the obvious. Blasco

Ibanez may not have been the favorite author of his time

with Spanish critics, but the fact remains that he is one

of the most widely read Spanish authors of all times. Del

Rio affirms that, "no se le puede negar. . . que sea uno

de los maestros del realism© espanol,"^ and Rafael Conte

still more emphatically notes that "Vicente Blasco Ibanez

es el escritor espanol mas traducido de toda la historia

de nuestra literatura, despues de Cervantes."^

Critics of the opposition erroneously, or perhaps

deliberately, overlook the international importance of

Blasco Ibanez's works in their zeal to discredit him.

Although the rationale is usually aesthetically or poli­

tically biased, their arguments bear examining. Those

aspects of Blasco's works which lead some critics to

condemn him are seen by others as qualities which make

Blasco what he is, and thus they credit him for achieve­

ment where opponents find shortcomings.

14

15

Perhaps the most logical or objective of these

attempts to discredit Blasco Ibanez targets his use of

incorrect grammar. Northup writes: "(H)e is crude, un-

grammatical at times, and always without polish."^ But

this critic's following statement suggests an underlying

hostility as the real reason for this view: "He is com­

mercial and too prolific" (Northup 386). The accusation

concerning incorrect grammar is not entirely unfounded for

Blasco Ibanez often exploited the natural flow of language

to achieve more poignant results.^ This trait, and fre­

quent use of the imperfect tense, are two of his most

visible attributes. He is, as will be remembered, a

descriptive writer—a naturalist—although not to every­

one a complete adherent of that school. Conte in his

authentically original manner attempts to set us straight;

"En el fondo, era un romantico que utilizaba las tecnicas

del naturalismo" (Conte 518).

Two other critics, Aubrey Bell and Gonzalo Torrente

Ballester coincide in admiring Blasco Ibanez's "vitality,"

or energy and hard work, but that is their only concession

among varied less conciliatory remarks which concede

little of the credit due him as a world renowned author.

Bell states that "Senor Blasco Ibanez has an overwhelming

personality but little imagination,"^ yet adds somewhat

inconsistently, that Blasco Ibanez may be successful in

16

"extricating himself from the cosmopolitan, cinemato­

graphic wave of inartistic chaos that has temporarily

overwhelmed him" (Bell 93). Later, however, in the same

analysis Bell states that Blasco Ibanez "wrestles with a

subject which a less energetic and living writer would

not have attempted, only to present us with a block of

dead matter for his pains" (94).

Torrente Ballester, on the other hand, states: "Bus-

car en la obra de Blasco Ibanez valores literarios. . . es

tarea inutil," and sums up with, "del resto de su obra

[all except the regional novels] solo quedan argumentos

bien trabados para el cine."^ However, no documentation

is adduced in support of this position which seemed to be

prevalent during the Franco regime.

On the other hand, not all criticism of Blasco Ibanez

is entirely negative; some contains positive elements

worthy of note. Sainz de Robles summarizes Blasco Iba­

nez 's artistic abilities by stating: "la mayoria lectora

sigue gustando la prosa vehemente y corriente, la retina

luminosa captadora de grandes mezclas de colores crudos,

la psicologia sin complicaciones, la imaginacion des-

bocada, [which form] el realismo ardiente de Blasco

Ibanez."^ Conte reaffirms the view that Blasco Ibanez was

able to achieve success and be an important author due to

his "estilo intense, colorista, apto para las mas

17

efectistas descripciones" (Conte 517). In short, critical

analysis of Blasco Ibanez may be either positive or nega­

tive, but let it suffice to say that both sides recognize

his "abnormal" (exceptional) abilities in creating vivid

narratives.

Perhaps it is true that between 1903 and 1907

Blasco's "art is sacrificed [albeit not totally] to

propaganda" (Northup 325), but to condemn without

qualification that period of Blasco Ibanez's works is to

forget his governmental job, and responsibilities, in Ma­

drid. He was, at the time, a Valencian representative as

well as a writer with a cause, but he was adept at por­

traying his cause in a literary form. He knew what was

literature and what was propaganda.

Years later he was involved in more than one strictly

propaganda experiment, one being the pamphlet "Lo que sera

la Republica espanola,"^ the other Espana con Honraf a

weekly tabloid written in collaboration with Unamuno at­

tacking the Monarchy. They favored a Republican form of

government and considered action necessary in order to

stimulate the Spanish people, and foment a Republican gov­

ernment. But as may be surmised, Blasco Ibanez was not

happy just to have this tabloid published; he would also

have it flown by plane into Spain and distributed liter­

ally por correo aereo. However, the highly belligerent

18

propagandistic tone is not noticeable in the novels writ­

ten between 1903 and 1907; they are, merely, literary

works whose themes happen to be political.

Without a doubt, "Blasco Ibanez no es humorista."^^

In fact, as would be expected of any practitioner of

naturalism, there is seldom any humor in his works. He

did not care about writing humor, nor did he wish to

tickle the reader's fancy. Rather, he told it like it

was, exactly as he saw it, including the good, the bad,

and the ugly. Blasco Ibanez himself states that, "Yo

procedo por explosion, violenta y ruidosamente,"^^ and

this is undoubtedly one of the primary reasons why some

critics find his writings less than admirable, or even

"common." He is, after all, not simply a peruser of his

novels, but rather a thought-transcriber and image maker.

Blasco's novels do at times reflect his life; Concep­

cion Iglesias identifies eight of his novels which are at

least partially autobiographical.^^ These novels contain

data from his youth, his various love affairs and his life

in general and include, among others, Flor de Mavo, Entre

naranios, Sanqre v arena, Los Arqonautas, as well as one

which he ordered burned—although one or two copies still

exist—La voluntad de vivir. All of these "autobiogra­

phies," were written before 1908, except Sanqre v arena

(1908) and Los Arqonautas (1914) and consequently

19

exemplify a different style of writing from that examined

in this study. Primarily, all but the last two seem to be

provoked by profound events which the author dissects.

Sanqre v arena, as well as La maia desnuda and La voluntad

de vivir, is a psychological novel, but with less self-

involvement by the author in the text; he is able to

distance himself from his characters and their problems.

Los Arqonautas, on the other hand, is a novel which stands

by itself as the most recent of the "autobiographies" and

part of Blasco Ibanez's uncompleted American cycle.

Since these works do reflect the personal life of

Blasco Ibanez, they are not comparable to works by any of

the author's contemporaries. He was, as were his works,

unique, neither to be emulated by anyone nor to be com­

pared to anyone else: "Yo me enorgullezco de ser un

escritor lo menos literate posible; quiere deeir, le

menos prefesienal" (Iglesias 148). He was, to use the

words of Ortega y Gasset, an "excellent man,"^^ seeking

these heights and imposing on himself those demands which

made him as debatable as he is.

One element which helps to make Blasco Ibanez such a

debatable author is his us of color symbolism. As indi­

cated by the title, this study concerns itself with color

symbolism in selected works of Vicente Blasco Ibanez.

Although this author wrote many works in which color plays

20

an important part, the two primary ones selected for study

are Sanqre v arena and Los cuatro iinetes del Apocalipsis.

These two novels have not been examined in this particular

fashion before; indeed, the only valuable in-depth study

which my research has discovered at all concerning the

writings of Blasco Ibanez and his use of color symbolism

is a single 1967 article treating La barraca.^^

In his essay of nearly a quarter-century ago. Dr.

Vernon Chamberlin calls attention to "la importancia, la

dependencia mutua, y la unidad creadora de dos de los ele-

mentos mas importantes. . . las imagenes animalistas y el

uso del color rojo" (Chamberlin 23). Although the greater

part of his article deals with animal symbolism, the

author does focus on the coloring abilities of Blasco

Ibanez by examining the various tones of red in relation­

ship to the action of the work. Only the use of red is

analyzed because of all the colors in the novel "el rojo

es uno de los colores mas frecuentes." (30) This hue is

found throughout the work, but it becomes more pronounced

when "hay violento combate directo entre personas" (31)

and such usage "avanza la novela hacia sus mementos clima-

tices." (34) Furthermore, because "el rojo es un color

basice y primitive" (35), Blasce's manipulation of it al­

lows him to penetrate and work "en la subcensciencia del

lector" (35). In addition, Chamberlin clarifies that the

21

powerfulness and effectiveness of the novelist is estab­

lished due not to his ideological content—as many would

say of others of his works—but, because "uno se hunde y

el autor le lleva—hasta le ebliga—a proyectarse y a

participar mental y emecionalmente en la novela" (36). As

this critic suggests, this is achieved, at least in part,

by color symbolism. Thus, there is already a basis for

affirming the importance of color symbolism in at least

one of Blasco Ibanez's works. This study will expand on

the nature and function of Blasce's use of color and its

contribution to narrative impact in the two aforenamed

novels.

Blasco Ibanez may have been egotistical and of unre­

fined behavior as some observers have asserted, but his

demageguery is net pronounced in the novels examined in

this study. One of his primary strengths as a narrator as

evinced in these two novels comes from his coloring abili­

ties. In the tenth, and final, chapter of Sanqre v arena,

colors are utilized to help build the tension se that at

the climax the reader can almost literally see the moment

when "hombre y fiera ne fermaron mas que una sola masa, y

asi se movieron algunes pases. "-̂ ^ In Les cuatro iinetes

del Apocalipsis, the apogee of plot tension is achieved by

the author's manipulation of color symbolism in the over­

threw and recenquest of Desnoyer's castle, and his

22

presence at the Battle of the Marne. In ether words,

although Blasco Ibanez may have used many ether literary

elements in these particular novels, a most important and

decisive factor of the works under consideration in the

present study is color symbolism.

Previous lack of sufficient attention to this partic­

ular aspect of Blasce's work, demonstrated by the dearth

of published research of said aspect, is to be at least

somewhat remedied by the present study which was prompted

by what three critics have to say: Montoliu states that

"[Blasco] sobresale ademas por el arte con que sabe pintar

el ambiente en que se desarrollan los asuntes de sus

novelas. "-̂ ^ Northup notes, "He interests chiefly by the

attractive descriptions of Valencian life in his early

novels" (Northup 386). Romero-Navarra asserts that "Pesee

en grade sumo el den de reflejar, con vigor incomparable,

la naturaleza fisica. Tanta plenitud de vida come les

personajes suele tener el escenarie en casi todas sus

novelas" (Romero-Navarra 658) In short, these critics

suggest that Blasco Ibanez is a much better descriptive

than dialogue writer, implying that one of his primary

attributes which make him what he is is his artistic

coloring. He has, in effect, "el den de celerear las

cesas come si fuese pinter" (Suarez 377). His use of

color, in fact, is one of his stronger points or talents

23

as a writer. Color is one of the elements which permits

him to describe situations and events while effectively

evoking many impressions. It allows him to draw forth

images in the reader's mind and is so suggestive that the

power of imagination is used to the fullest extent with

significant results. It permits him to create without the

tediousness of a miner author, facilitating the portrayal

that he desires and conveying the message without exces­

sive information. Perhaps his life and works were best

summed up by Federico Carlos Sainz de Robles: "(E)s

precise reconecerle su portentesa imaginacion, su expre-

sividad, muy sugestiva . . . sus faciles y brillantes

imagenes. . . Blasco pone cierte optimismo en su natura­

lismo. . . (A)m6 apisienadamente [sic] la lucha. . . de

ninguna de ellas [his novels] puede afirmarse que sea una

mala novela" (Sainz de Robles 87).

That is, all of the critics would seem to agree that

Blasco Ibanez merits attention. Seme are unsympathetic or

even hostile, implying that he wrapped himself up in his

own little world letting success and fame go to his head.

Others defend him, stating his artistic abilities as

undeniable qualities which make him what he is, and still

ether critics declare that the regional novels are his

best productions worthy of merit. Ne matter the view­

point, whether coming from a conservative observer

24

influenced by the France regime, or an ardent supporter

biased by some particular aesthetic preference, one should

remember that many of these criticisms will seen be re­

placed due to the ongoing reevaluation of Blasco Ibanez's

works, which is presently occurring, in a mere compatible

ideological environment.

25

Notes

^ Jeremy Medina, "The Artistry of Blasco Ibanez's Flor de Mavo," Hispania 65 (1982), 210.

2 Angel del Rio, Historia de la literatura espanola. Tome II (New York: Holt Rinehart and Winston, 1963), 218-219.

^ Rafael Conte, "Vicente Blasco Ibanez: Lecciones de un centenario," Cuadernos Hispanoamericanos, Ne. 216 (1967), 514.

^ George Northup, An Introduction to Spanish Literature, 3rd ed. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1960), 386.

5 This is amply pointed out in Bernardo Suarez's article, "La creacion artistica en «La barraca» de Blasco Iba­nez," Cuadernos Hispanoamericanos No. 371 (1981), 371-385.

^ Aubrey Bell, Contemporary Spanish Literature (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1933), 91-92.

^ Gonzalo Torrente Ballester, Literatura espanola contem­poranea (Madrid; Alfrodisio Aguado, 1949), 181.

^ Federico Carles Sainz de Robles, La novela espanola en el siqlo XX (Madrid: Pegase, 1957), 87.

^ For a more complete study of this see Victor Ouimette's "Unamuno, Blasco Ibanez, and Espana con Henra," Bulle­tin of Hispanic Studies 53 (October 1976).

^^ M. Remera-Navarro, Historia de la literatura espanola, 2nd ed. (Boston: D.C. Heath y Compania, 1949), 658.

^^ Concepcion Iglesias, Blasco Ibanez; Un novelista para el mundo (Madrid: Silex, 1985), 131.

^2 Among these are the popular Flor de Mayo and Sanqre y arena. For a mere complete listing, see chapters 5 and 6 of Iglesias's previously cited work.

13 This should in ne way be construed as a personal re­flection of Ortega y Gasset en Blasco Ibanez, but as Ortega y Gasset's reflection en humanity in chapter seven of La rebelion de las masas.

26

Vernon Chamberlin, "Las imagenes animalistas y el color rojo en La barraca," Duquesne Hispanic Review 6 (October 1967), 23-36.

Vicente Blasco Ibanez, Los cuatro iinetes del Apocalip­sis, 3rd ed. (Valencia: Premetee, 1916), 392.

•̂^ Manuel de Montolui, Literatura Castellana (Barcelona: Editorial Cervantes, 1929), 835.

CHAPTER III

APPROACH AND DEFINITIONS

The following analysis of Sanqre y arena and Les

cuatro iinetes del Apocalipsis will employ a quasi-

scientific-quantitative-thematic approach. The word

quasi-scientific is used because completely scientific

observation would not be applicable to literature. The

procedures used may be summarized as follows: First came

identification of the selected reading passage from each

novel. These particular passages were chosen because they

contain the thematic highpoint, the climax, of each work.

Consequently, these passages should reveal the use of

colors mere fully because they should contain in the space

of a few pages such important elements as suspense

building, plot, characterization, localization—or

setting, the climax, and a denouement. Second, the

passages were divided into sections, or divisions, accord­

ing to the content, plot and characterization encountered

on the pages, and all of the color-related words were

noted. Net only words such as bianco, reio, and neqre

were identified, but words such as palema, sanqre, and

carbenizade, which connote chromatic images, were extrac­

ted. As will be explained later, the most usual, or

"typical," hue associated with these elements is assumed

27

28

(e.g., rio is blue and net brown or green unless se speci­

fied).

The relevant color words—called color references, or

color elements, in this study—were first noted and then

grouped into classifications. The first of these, which

had seven subsets, comprised colors of the light wave:

red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet.

Each of these colors is referred to as a separate color

type, with the first three being warm colors, and the last

three being cold colors. Another four color types were

noted—white, black, gray, and brown—and are included,

along with these of the light wave, in the classification

called "Strictly colors." Thus, this latter group in­

cludes eleven color types and approximately 77% of all

the color references in the two novels.

The ether 23% of the color references relate to color

elements which de not necessarily evoke a specific visual

color, but de correspond to mental images produced by

light. These include, among ethers, laqrimas, botella,

and vidries in the subset of "Clearness." "Brightness"

includes brillante, estallar, fulqer, and light-refracting

metals, such as revolver, bayeneta, canones, and cine.

The third subset of these three groups, collectively

referred to as "Intensity," is "Blurriness," and includes,

among others: qrasa, cirie, and borresa.

29

These color groupings produce fourteen different

classifications, into one of which each color element may

be placed. Collectively, all fourteen compose the grand

cate gory of "Color," as used in this study.

An analysis of the words was then made; this analysis

comprises chapters four and five of this study. Due to

the approximately equal length of each division of the

reading passage from Sanqre v arena, except the fourth

which is almost one-half the others in length, the data

can be examined rather easily in a comparative analysis of

Blasco Ibanez's use of color in the build-up to, and de­

nouement from, the climax. However, because of the wide

discrepancy of the length of the divisions of Los cuatro

iinetes del Apocalipsis—9.5, 15 and 5 pages respectively,

the numerical figure assigned each real value noted for

purpose of comparison will be less easily cross-studied

through the three divisions.

Afterwards, a summary of the study was made and is

included as a part of this study in chapter six. The

same chapter ends with a conclusion, encapsulating in a

final recapitulation the most important points of this

research.

As stated by Dr. Wendell McClendon, the use of colors

in a literary text is oftentimes very important;

30

Color imagery is one form of visual imagery. Visual imagery is the most frequent type of sensory imagery in writing, since stories depend only upon descriptions of settings, characters, and actions. Color imagery reinforces visual imagery, by bringing described objects, people, places, and events into sharper focus and by adding to them the emotional content associated with the colors. A child's wagon, especially closely described, carries some power of its own. The same wagon called apple-red takes on still greater significance, and that apple-red wagon with gleaming white letters emblazoned on one side, its shiny rounds of black rubber around glinting metal hubs...—you get the picture.-^

and he sums up with:

These [colors] cannot go unnoticed by the attentive reader. In the writings of skillful novelists with a painterly bent, they become integral to the reader's understanding of how the novel works, and, thus, of its outcome. To image such writings without their color imagery is to discover texts far inferior.

With this in mind, there are included in this anal­

ysis as color references more than just simple words

which have a "hue" denotation. Color is relative; the

meaning, connotation, or hue quality of each particular

"color" (denotation) can, and dees, change;

If one says "Red" (the name of a color) and there are fifty people listening, it can be expected that there will be fifty reds in their minds. And one can be sure that all these reds will be very different. . . What dees this shew?. . . [It shews that] the nomen­clature of color is most inadequate. Though there are only about thirty color names.^

Any literary examination, then, of only "hues" would be

31

insufficient and only partially indicative of the coloring

effects in a text. This is true primarily true because

(f)rem it [the psychology of color] we learn that colors have absolute values, as well as associative ones. By manipulating background colors and circum­ambient lighting, experimenters can produce given meeds in subjects: nausea, languor, serenity, coeperativeness, irritableness, [or] excitation.^

In light of this, the examination of colors in Sanqre

v arena and Les cuatro iinetes del Apocalipsis must be

mere thorough than to limit itself to only particular

denotative values of color. Adequate analysis must encom­

pass all tones and shades employed in the work. In order

to accomplish this, in this particular study in cases

where a chrome isn't specified, but yet where a hue is

obvious, the most common connotation is assumed: cisne

as white although theoretically it could be black, aqua

as blue instead of green or muddy brown. These assump­

tions are made based on the belief that it is the respon­

sibility of the author, especially one as prolific and

talented as Blasco Ibanez, to specify if the reader

should visualize the abnormal, or a lesser frequent

symbol.

Symbol, as defined in this study is not necessarily

"an object, animate or inanimate, which represents or

•stands for' something else."^ Neither is "metaphor"

32

necessarily implied when speaking of color symbols in the

examination of Sanqre v arena and Les cuatro iinetes del

Apocalipsis, although at times this relationship may be

applicable. Rather, when speaking of a "symbol" in this

study, the implication may also be "eveker." Colors may

be symbols in the traditional sense of the word—and, as

occasionally pointed out, they are; at the same time,

they may also be used to produce certain meeds in the

reader. Thus, what are seme of the traditional color

"symbols" in the work? Hew does Blasco Ibanez use colors

to enhance and manipulate the novels to produce given

moods? How does the author use colors to evoke images and

ideas in the reader's mind? How does Blasco Ibanez use

colors to portray his characters and the scenes? How de

these influence the reader's perception of these charac­

ters? Are the "evocations" and the traditional symbols

the same? These are the central questions which this

study will attempt to answer.

33

Notes

1 Letter dated 11 October, 1989, from Dr. Wendell McClendon.

2 Josef Albers, Interaction of Color (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1971), 3.

3 John M. Haller, "The Semantics of Color," ETC.; A Re­view of General Semantics, XXVI,2 (1969), 201.

^ J. A. Cuddon, A Dictionary of Literary Terms (New York: Viking Penguin, 1979), 671.

CHAPTER IV

COLOR ANALYSIS OF

SANGRE Y ARENA

This study implicitly compares and contrasts a novel

from two definite, and different, literary periods of

Blasco Ibanez's works. They are different in theme, as

will be observed later, but let it suffice new to say that

the 1908 novel is a psychological study of the mentality

of a Spanish pastime—bullfighting. The second novel,

from 1916, is a fictionalized historical account of the

"Battle of the Marne" and an attempt to support, and

propagate, the cause of the Allies in World War I.

Sanqre y arena, 1908, portrays and examines the life

of Juan Gallardo from his childhood all the way to his

days of fame and fortune as a nationally renowned bull­

fighter. After being injured by a bull, however, he loses

his nerve and courage to properly stand his ground, face

the challenge, and please the aficionados. Thus, his fame

quickly diminishes until one day he forces himself to the

level"of his former exploits. That day his wife Carmen,

who had never been to a bullfight previously, unbeknownst

to her husband went to Madrid to see him in action. Al­

though net really wanting to see her husband injured, of

which she had been having premonitions, she was present at

34

35

the time of impact between man and bull and knew first­

hand the dangers of the sport.

With this short plot summary in mind, the approach

with Sanqre v arena involved dividing the climatic chapter

into parts by means of variations in plot materials, and

en this basis the chapter falls easily into four sections.

The first three are almost symmetrical in that they con­

tain 7, 7.5 and 6.5 pages respectively, the last entails

only three pages, or slightly less than half the others.

The first division presents the trip of Carmen, the

matador's wife, from her home, to Madrid and her praying

before the Virgen de la Palema to protect her beloved.

The second part of the chapter moves directly to the arena

itself. Here a picador is wounded; Juan, the matador,

rushes to his rescue and is enthusiastically applauded by

the crowd for his bravery and finesse. In the third part,

however, Juan is unable to fearlessly face a bull which

had circled the arena, and to which banderillas de fueqo

had been applied. The fourth division comprises net only

a conclusion of the chapter and novel, but also Blasco

Ibanez's thesis synopsis in which he condemns bull­

fighting.

That is, these divisions are neither arbitary nor

construed without a reason. They facilitate an in-depth

character analysis which might otherwise be overlooked, or

36

at least not appear as clearly, in a mere typical page-by-

page or unit-chapter study. With this breakdown one can

examine mere closely Carmen—division one—as well as the

three distinct stages of Juan's last bullfighting day, or

expanded to a more general term, critical moments symbolic

of his fame, hesitation, and final defeat. Thus, by

narrowing the study primarily to the examination of two

characters, and factors influencing them, specificities

may be noted which a broader-scoped analysis would tend to

discount.

With this in mind, the data gathered from these divi­

sions are quite interesting. As noted in Table 1, there

are, in the first division twenty-nine instances in which

colors are employed in the primary text; each instance is

called a color reference. These range from Carmen's "ejes

enrojecidos,"^ to the "cabezas tendidas y palidas per la

emocion siguiendo la veloz carrera del tore" (378), to the

"clear" botellas (377) used by Carmen as candlestick

holders. In the second section there are fifty-seven

references. Red, the most common color, is primarily

sanqre, while brown is the color new used which was net

employed in the former section. Seme of these include;

suele, the "color. . . castane de les animales quedaba

brillante" (382) and the excremente scattered from the

gored animals. In the third part there are forty-six

37

colors. Red, as in each section, is again the most common

element, but now these are primarily concerned with the

red muleta, also called the trapo reio. Encountered for

the first time is another warm color: "Comenzaban a caer

en el redondel. . . naranjas. . . en terno a la bestia

fugitiva" (388). And in the final pages of the novel

there are twenty-three color references in which red new

is primarily a lack of blood. These include, among

others: "nadie habia visto sangre" (393) and "ne se veia

sangre" (394). Other coloring also occurs with blancura

verdosa, eios vidrieses and "el tore. . . que arrastraban

por la arena en aquel memento con el cuello carbenizade y

sanguinelento" (396). That is, there is an average of

6.46 color references per page in this reading passage.

One interesting point which supports the hypothesis

that Blasco Ibanez intentionally manipulated color is that

in each division of the passage, except the third, ne mat­

ter the number of color references, there are only eight

different color types used; in the third division there

are nine. But also in the third division there are four

types which contain only one reference, whereas the first

and second divisions have only one type with a single

element. As may be noted in Table 1, section four has

three types with only a single element, but none of these

pertains to the warm or cold colors of the light wave.

38

Interestingly, all four divisions of the chapter in­

clude the five color elements white, black, gray, red and

yellow. In fact, these five account for 73% of the entire

color references in the chapter; the latter two alone

constitute 46%. In addition, three of the four sections

take in clearness and brightness while two embrace blur­

riness and brown. Furthermore, orange, green and blue are

encountered at least once in the chapter. That is, the

"solitary element," the color reference found only once,

in sections one and two is black; it is white and green in

division four. But in the third part, the "solitary ele­

ments" are white, orange—the only occurrence in the

entire passage—brown, and yellow, which is the second

most frequent color reference in the other portions of the

chapter.

Mere clearly stated, the second division of the chap­

ter, which glorifies and exemplifies the heroic stature

of Juan, the matador, harbors the greatest number of color

elements: fifty-seven; 35% of which are of the category

red. Carmen "sentiase atraida per el rojo mareader de la

sangre" (381); a horse "guardaba [between its teeth]. . .

celgajes de piel y peles rejos" (383), and when Carmen has

to leave the stands it is because "la angustiaba la sangre

que corria per el patio" (384). Page 382, which takes in

the greatest number of color elements, seventeen, is also

39

the page which gives the description of a gored horse and

the "surgery" to keep it alive in order for it to finish

its function in the match. Some of these are included in

the following citation;

Pugnaban las manes sangrientas de les curanderes por devolver a la abierta cavidad las flacidas entranas; pero la respiracion jadeante de la victima las hin-chaba. . . . Cuando el caballo quedaba «arreglade», con barbara prentitud, le echaban un cube de agua per la cabeza. . . . Unes, apenas caminaban dos pases, caian redondos, derramando un chorro de sangre. (382)

The only other page in this section to hold a double-

digit number of color elements, twelve, is 380, the page

which reveals Carmen's seeing for the first time in her

life the blood and effects of a picador being gored:

Carmen needed to "ver el sol. . . . Salio al patio.

Sanqre per todos lades: sanqre en el suele y en las in-

mediacienes de unas cubas, donde el aqua mezclabase con

el licuido reio" (380, emphasis added). On these two

pages alone 50% of the section's coloring occurs; with

this in mind, one can see that the increase in color

references occurs with the presentation of traumatic

events.

Also interesting to note is the fact that the page

which deals with a human being critically injured, 380,

contains fewer color references than that which portrays

animal injury; the former's portion of the division's

40

color references is 21% while the latter's is 30%. Beth

pages entail one brightness, clearness and brown. "El

color bianco o castane de los animales quedaba brillante,

cherreande sus peles un liquido de color rosa, mezcla de

agua y de sangre" (382). In reference to the picador,

Blasco Ibanez dees not describe the gored man himself, but

his surroundings: his "perneras de hierro," and the "san­

gre en el suele y en las inmediaciones de unas cubas,

donde el agua mezclabase con el liquido rojo" (380). Both

pages, as well, contain reds and yellows, four and two

respectively, on page 80 and five and three on page 382.

The reds, as one would suppose, come from blood. The

yellows on the earlier page are the sun and teeth, while

on the latter they are teeth, tourniquet twine and urine.

As is commonly understood, the color red acts as the

symbol for blood, and consequently violence. However,

mere than that, red, as is yellow, is a warm color, and

this group corresponds "to processes of. . . activity and

intensity."^

Beth these pages, in addition, contain the same types

of color references: gray, clearness, brightness, red,

yellow, and brown. Moreover, page 382 also has five white

elements: two veiiqas, two cubes de aqua, and one color

bianco of the horses. One can only speculate as to the

reasoning for the author's leaving white out of the human

41

injury, but perhaps the cause is that white is "an

allusion to those paradisiac isles which man has lest and

to which he returns again and again," (Cirlet 342) and

there is no "paradisiac isle" in bullfighting. As will be

shown later, Blasco Ibanez makes it clear that he is anti-

bullfighting and, thus, can allow no "good"—of which

white is commonly seen as a symbol—to intrude upon this

scene.

Chromatically, that is, in this second division only

nine color elements are used to glorify Juan in the four

pages which de so: 380, 381, 385, 386; these include five

grays, asembrar, tarde, etc., two reds, capote and reio,

and one yellow and brown, arena and suele respectively.

With this color distribution, one can see that the glory

of Juan—which is what this division really contains and

represents—is at best cool. However, the bullfighter, as

a human, is not what is necessarily negatively viewed by

the author, and consequently he, the bullfighter, is

neither given the glory, innocence, or purity of whiteness

nor the evilness, "emptiness or deficiency"^ of black, but

due to his role in the tereo, which Blasco Ibanez "despre-

ciaba,"^ Juan is allotted a combination of both white and

black, sprinkled with red, yellow and brown. In this

manner the author is able to avoid mono-chromatic suffo­

cation and implicit out-right condemnation of Juan.

42

The second division contains six pages, or portions

thereof, in which the destructiveness of bullfighting is

described, utilizing thirty-nine color elements. These

include fifteen reds, of which ten, or 25.6%, are varia­

tions of the word sanqre. There are six whites: the

whiteness of the horses' coat, and Carmen's becoming

palida at the sight of all the bleed (379), among ethers.

Seven browns are also a part of this second division.

Four of these are the suele on which the smitten beasts

fall; the ethers are estopa and bramante, describing the

horses' job; and the excremente from the gored horses'

innards strewn all ever the ground.

Four yellows, although theoretically brightening the

picture, do not add cheer or vitality to the story-line;

rather, they accentuate the brutality: "(E)l vientre

abierto de la bestia, que esparcia en terno regueros de

sangre y de erin" (382), and "(the horses) checaban les

dientes largos y amarillentes con un escalofrie de mar-

tirio" (382). Aiding in this dismal toning are the four

grays, one being during the "horse operation" when, with

its head being held to the ground, the horse's relinches

were "perdiendose en el pelvo" (382). The brightness of

the horses' coats manifests itself, as does the clearness

of water, but these are counteracted, or negated, by the

multiplicity of negatives, culminating in the sole black

43

of the section: "la sangre corria entre las piedras, en-

negreciendose al secarse" (383). Thus, in spite of the

eight different color types used for coloring effects,

this division of the chapter shows a heightened intensity

of violence and destruction through the constant preoccu­

pation with bleed.

Stated another way, there are two pages emphasizing

the destructiveness of the bullfights to every one glor­

ifying the matador. At the same time, the author includes

mere than four color elements describing that negative for

every one lauding the matador in his finest hour. In

other words, in the only section to tolerate the actions

of this protagonist of bullfighting, there are five color

words describing the destructiveness of the sport for

every one praising the hero.

The difference in the portrayals of this protagonist

and the destructiveness, however, is net limited merely to

quantitative manipulations. There are only three warm

color elements used in the entirety of Juan's coloring and

none of these refers directly to Juan himself, but to his

capote—two—and sand—one. Three of the five grays refer

to the advanced hour of the day, and the other two are

elements beyond Juan's control—the filthiness of his uni­

form and the astas of the rushing bull. The final color

referent is a brown—the ground itself.

44

With this in mind, it can be seen that even though

Juan is cast in a starring role, he himself lacks direct

coloring. His environs are colored, but with an average

of 7.60 color elements per page in this division, the'

reader is forced to unconsciously question why none of the

color references is directly attributable to Juan, the

person. That is, the author in a twist of symbolism uses

this element—color—to drive home the point and ensure

that the reader understands that bullfighting and these

who participate in it are not to be praised by him.

In section one of the chapter intensity is equally as

important as the colors of the light wave.^ That is, ex­

cluding black (the absence of light), white (the presence

of all light), and gray (a mixture of the previous two),

as much emphasis is placed en the boldness and recessive-

ness of color as on the pigment itself. In fact, of the

category "Strictly Colors" there are only two of the eight

other possibilities portrayed in section one, and these

two, red and yellow, are the primary coloring factors

associated with Juan's wife. Carmen, who has "ejes enro-

jecides" (376) and is depicted three times with specific

luces. The whites of this division ewe themselves to the

"miles de cabezas tendidas y palidas per la emocion si­

guiendo la veloz carrera del tore" (378), the white hat

of the cunade, and of the Virgen de la Palema before which

45

Carmen prays for Juan. She herself is dressed in black,

and the grays are a result of the time of day. Conse­

quently, the reader is unconsciously forced to consider

the probability that Carmen is symbolic, or representa­

tive, of the death angel, and, as well, at the same time

she is a foreshadowing of her own widowhood.

As noted in Table 1, there are four references each

to brightness and blurriness, and three to clearness—that

is, eleven intensity references. Demonstrations of clear­

ness include botellas (377), Carmen's "llorando come si

diese per cierta su desgracia" (375), and her "lagrimas de

una nerviesidad" (373); even though tears may cause things

to blur, they in themselves are clear. Blurriness occurs

three times as cirie—since the particular hue of the wax

is not known—and once as imaqen borresa, while brightness

is displayed through primavera, espuelas and the velas—

again, specific hue not revealed—that Carmen burns. In

addition, there are eleven references pertaining to the

light wave—six reds and five yellows. These include,

among ethers. Carmen's "ejes enrejecidos" (376) and the

Virgen de la Palema, which becomes an "imagen borresa,

enrojecida per las luces" (377). At the same time—in

section one—only seven color elements relate to white,

black, and gray. With such coloring effects being applied

primarily to the characterization, rather than plot

46

advancement, the author emphasizes the intensity of the

atmosphere and characters themselves at the expense of the

plot and activity in this section.

The third most populous segment in regards to color

elements depicts Juan's humiliation—the third division of

the chapter. Here again, as in the second subsection, the

major focus of color is not Juan, but an animal element,

this time a bull—not the stereotypical arena bull, but a

non-fighting, frightened bull. The three pages devoted to

this bull's flight around the arena provide twenty-eight

color references; that is, 60.9% of all the color refer­

ences in the six and a half pages of this section appear

on these three pages. Twelve of the twenty-eight refer­

ences, or 42.9%, are red, and thus carry the reader

rapidly along in the "surging and tearing emotions"

(Cirlet 53) of the crowd and its desire to eliminate the

unfit bull. Eight of these twelve deal directly with the

banderillas de fueqo and the crowd's yelling "—jFuego!

. . . jFueeego!" (387) The others include; "El presidente

agito al fin un panuelo rojo" (388), "el tore, al ne sen-

tir la quemazon del fuege, quedo inmovil . . . sacande una

lengua seca, de rojo obscure" (389), and a little latter,

the bull's "ejes enrejecidos" (389). Another 25%, or

seven color references painting the bull's flight, relate

to "putrificatien" (Cirlet 56), or the color black.

47

including the "banderillas que parecian enfundadas en

papel negro" (388), and the hair of the bull being chamus-

cado, quemade and carbenizade (388-389). Thus, almost 68%

of the color elements of these three pages symbolically

underscore the destructiveness and evil of this sport—

whether infecting the aficionados or suffered by the bull.

Suspense builds again in the last section beginning

with the fall of Juan after impact with the bull. The

reader does not for two complete pages knew what Juan's

actual prognosis is; in this interval seventeen color

elements are used to carry the novel toward the final

conclusion. These references are divided among eight

chromatic types, yellow being the most common: Juan "cayo

en la arena, encegide come un ano enorme de seda y ere"

with his "cabeza. . . amarillenta" (393), and a "luz que

entraba per una claraboya del teche" (394) of the infir­

mary to where he had been carried. Four variations of

sanqre appear en these pages, all, except the last one,

being strictly passive or negative instances: "Nadie

habia visto sangre" (393); thoughts of Juan's "espada

ensangrentade [sic]" (392) which had been seen before;

another affirmation of "Ne se veia sangre," and, finally,

when the obstructing clothes are removed, one sees en

Juan's stomach "una abertura tertuesa de labies ensan-

grentades" (394). In addition to red, the color elements

48

gray, white, black, green, blue and clearness are mani­

fested by the gray "picador magullado" (394), "cabeza del

espada [Juan], palida" (393), "negruras de la virilidad"

(394), Juan's complexion as "blancura verdosa" (393),

"piltrafas de fresco azul" (394), and the fallen matador's

"ejes vidrieses" (393). Only one of the references is

used in dealing with the certainty of Juan's death—"los

ojos [of the banderillol se le hinchaban a impulses de las

lagrimas" (395) when he ascertained Juan's death. By con­

trast, six are used in the one-half page conclusion:

Penso en el tore, al que arrastraban por la arena en aquel memento con el cuello carbenizade y sanguine-lento, rigidas las patas y unes ojos vidrieses que miraban al espacio azul come miran les muertos. . . (396)

Thus, color functions strikingly in moving the plot

toward the climax. But in the truly suspenseful and cli­

mactic final moments, there is a lack of intense hueing.

Three elements of clearness appear in the final section,

but none of brightness or blurriness. Interestingly, ne

elements of gray are utilized following Juan's death.

Blasco Ibanez uses color to further the action and

heighten its vividness, but apparently dees net find it

necessary in this case to intensify the climax.

A prime example of Blasce's action-coloring occurs in

the first division. During this page-long supplication of

49

Carmen to the Virgen de la Palema—"la Virgen de les tore­

ros, la que escuchaba sus eraciones de ultima hora"(378) —

there are fifteen color images of six different color

types, or, stated quantitatively, 53% of the color refe­

rences in this section are found on this one page alone.

All three subsets of intensity are present, running the

gamut from the brightness of Carmen's velas lit in prayer

to the clearness of botellas, and en to the imaqen borresa

to which she prays in search of divine intervention. This

image, however, is "enrojecida por las luces," (376) and

consequently, one sees both red, white (palema), and

yellow in this painting of Carmen's prayer. The total

absence of any cool color underscores the fervency of her

oration.

Carmen, in fact, has mere yellow and red color refe­

rences than any of the ether colors—accounting for almost

37% of the color references in this division. According

to Cirlet, yellow symbolizes "magnanimity, intuition and

intellect" (Cirlet 54). Another critic says yellow repre­

sents the "vital spark" of life,^ while still another

notes that this color "represents sadness, despair, less

of hope, or trouble of any kind."^ The attribution of

intuition especially applies to Carmen; but at the same

time she is nervous and despondent from the outset of the

chapter. When she makes the journey to Madrid to divert

50

Juan from the inpending disaster, she is withheld by the

cunade from going to Juan's hotel room immediately pre­

ceding the corrida by his playing on fears of their being

thrown into jail. Her foreseeing the danger to Juan is

accentuated for the reader, net solely by Carmen herself,

but by the yellow background^ across which she moves. She

herself is not described, except as "vestida de negro"

(272) and having "ojos enrejecidos" (376). Net only Car­

men, but especially the situation in which she is found,

and the lighting against which she appears, permit the

reader to comprehend the level of foresight found here,

and which her coloring associations reinforce.

The red coloring, however, does come from the fore­

ground events. Against the darkened background of the

capilla. Carmen lights candles which burn and reflect the

"passion [and] sentiment" (Cirlet 54) that torture her and

are tearing her inwardly apart, as evinced by her eyes

full of tears. Responding to the "activity and intensity"

(Cirlet 52) of warm colors, she actually becomes a part of

these warm color processes. In fact, except for the

single exception of Carmen's being dressed in black, this

entire first segment is dominated by warm colors.

Although there is a general effect of red en yellow

throughout this section, the element "intensity" is almost

evenly split. Clearness comes in from Carmen's "lagrimas

51

de una nerviesidad excitada por el miede" (373), caused by

her clearly foreseeing Juan's demise, and motivating her

attempts to save Juan through obtaining divine interven­

tion. Blurriness appears in the one instance of Carmen's

seeing a blurry image, as well as the waxiness of the

cirios which she wishes to burn. Brightness occurs in the

spurs she sees, as well as the Spring day and burning

velas. These instances of intensity tend to underscore

the yellow already present, se that Carmen's intuition

stands out.

Perhaps the reader may be unaware of some specific

nuances or esoteric ramifications of the color symbolism,

but the meed is se well set that the inevitable has al­

ready been foreshadowed. As already noted, yellow and

red are the only elements of the light wave which are used

in this first section, se that the reader is immersed in

the color symbolism and pschelogically invaded by the warm

coloring with its attendant effects and connotations from

the outset.

The distribution of Juan's coloring is also revealing

of Blasco Ibanez's use of color: While the first division

contains ne color references to the absent Juan, in the

second section there are two: one brown, "Se ha acestae

[sic] en el suele elante [sic] del tore" (381), and one

red, "Gallardo habia acudido con su capa, llevandese a la

52

fiera al centre del redondel. . . tras el engafie del trapo

rojo" (385). However, one must remember that this second

section has the greatest number of total color references,

fifty-seven, but the second least number attributed to

Juan, only two. The third section—Juan's shame—contains

twelve Gallardo coloring elements, among which are four

reds, two yellows, one gray, one brown, and four bright­

nesses. The brown again comes from the suele, but instead

of lying en it in front of the bull's nostrils, new Juan

is standing "con el trapo rojo junto al suele y la espada

horizontal a la altura de sus ojos. . . lA meter el

braze!" (392) The reds are invariably attributes of his

cape (trapo reio or muleta); the yellows refer to the

sand, and the brightnesses come from two so called este-

ques, before each plunge at the bull, and two so called

espadas, after each stab. Thus, while witnessing the

downfall of the protagonist, the reader unconsciously

perceives also that the coloring comes not from Juan him­

self, but from his environs and these objects which he

manipulates—or fails to manipulate successfully. The

fourth division of the passage has nine Juan color

references: These include two reds, three yellows, one

white, clearness and black, and even one startling, un­

expected, incongruous blue; the "piltrafas de fresco

azul" (394) of the wound.

53

Juan, as is Carmen, is portrayed primarily through

warm colors—almost 57% of his total coloring. Mere

coloration is attributed to Juan's person than Carmen's.

In the fifteen relevant pages of this passage which con­

tain color references attributed directly to Juan, only

9% are cold. Those, however, allude net to Juan's

character, but are descriptions of the fatal wound which

he received: the torn clothing "dejande visibles las

negruras de la virilidad," and the "piltrafas de fresco

azul" (394). Twenty-two percent of the elements pertain

to intensity, of which all but one—Juan's "ojos vidrie­

ses" (393)—refer not to the bullfighter, but to his

sword. It is worth noting that in spite of the thematic

disapproval of Blasco Ibanez of this sport, he doesn't

negatively portray the matador personally so much as the

consequences of the fight.

On the other hand, 23% of the warm color references,

results from Juan's being en the sand—15 of the 23% being

a direct consequence of the goring; "cayo en la arena,

enco-gide come un gusano enorme de seda y ore" (393).

Sixty-seven percent of the red comes from his capote; the

other 33% is related to the wound where initially "no se

veia sangre," but later there were "labies ensangrentades"

(394). Even in the existentially culminating moment of

Juan's life, which is a very bloody and gory event, the

54

reader does not experience an overwhelming sense of bleed.

Here, Blasco Ibanez seems to have used deliberate mani­

pulation of color as one would expect an overflowing

abundance of blood.

Perhaps such minimalization of blood from Juan's

downfall is a further attempt to demonstrate the inevit­

able savagery of the sport for the animals while the

humans generally are unscathed. On the other hand, it may

be to show that in spite of the unequal odds, bullfighting

can be inwardly lethal. At any rate, this passage con­

tains seventeen direct references to, and/or variations

of, the word sanqre; in addition, blood is once called

liquido reio. Eight such references, or 47%, appear in

four pages depicting the goring of the horses, while only

one, or 6%, describes Juan's injuries. The emphasis en

the cruelty to animals is unmistakable.

Examining the twelve color references related

directly with Juan in the third division, only three are

background—two of which involve yellow, the other, brown.

The foreground, however, contains four reds, four in­

stances of bright, and one gray—basically all associated

with capote and "sword." In the fourth division, by com­

parison, the foreground contains yellow, white, black,

blue, red and clearness in the description of Juan's con­

dition, while the background contains only yellow. One

55

sees, then, the fulfillment of Carmen's premonitions both

in the plot, as well as in a repetition of the first sec­

tion's background colors. Furthermore, in the same

section where Juan's capote and esteque control the

foreground and primary attention, Juan's humiliation and

downfall occur. The "passion, sentiment and the life-

giving principle" (Cirlet 54), represented by red (but

primarily associated with the animals and capote), do net

keep Juan from being denigrated and destroyed. Ironic­

ally, it is in Juan's moment of glory, with his best

estecada, that he meets defeat, in spite of the intensity

and warmness of the gear which he uses.

Given Blasce's use of foreshadowing and premonition,

the final outcome is all too forseeable as the reader

begins section four, especially when Juan is portrayed

with more color references per page than in any ether

section. Thirty-nine percent of the passage's color

references describe his condition in six different colors

in this section: two reds, three yellows, and one white,

clearness, black and blue. The author is intent en making

sure the reader clearly sees Juan's plight. That bull­

fighting is net an "iffy" proposition which seme may

approve while ethers disapprove, is quite obvious in the

clarity with which the novelist paints the figure of the

matador: Only one of the twenty-four grays or instances

56

of blurriness in the reading passage relates to the bull­

fighter; almost all others concern background information

or Carmen's religiously motivated attempts to save her

husband.

Juan is portrayed quite differently from Carmen, and

nowhere is this more dramatically so than in the colors

employed. Both play their roles against a background of

yellow, but whereas Carmen is primarily associated with

red, black and intensity, Juan is portrayed in multi­

colored hues. As the center of attention of the reader

and crowd he is exceptionally colorful, being portrayed by

nine of the fourteen possible color types. Blasce's imag­

inative use of color and skillful manipulation of aspects

of its symbolism helps to make the novel strong, vivid,

and moving.

57

Table 1: Color Analysis of Sanqre y arena

Section Color I II III IV Total % of Total

White 3 7 1 1 12 7.74

Black 1 1 8 2 12 7.74

Gray 3 10 3 1 17 10.97

Clearness

Blurriness

Brightness

Red

Orange

Yellow

Green

Blue

Indigo

Violet

3

4

4

6

0

5

0

0

0

0

2

0

3

20

0

7

0

0

0

0

0

2

8

21

1

1

0

0

0

0

3

0

0

6

0

6

1

3

0

0

8

6

15

53

1

19

1

3

0

0

5.16

3.87

9.68

34.19

0.65

12.26

0.65

1.94

0.00

0.00

Brown 0 7 1 0 8 5.16

Total 29 57 46 23 155 100.01

Per Page 4.14 7.60 7.08 7.67 6.46

58

Table 2: Color Analysis of Sanqre v arena: Juan Colorization

Section Color I II III IV Total

White 0 0 0

Black 0 0 0

Gray 0 0 1

Clearness

Blurriness

Brightness

Red

Orange

Yellow

Green

Blue

Indigo

Violet

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

1

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

4

4

0

2

0

0

0

0

1

0

0

2

0

3

0

1

0

0

1

0

4

7

0

5

0

1

0

0

Brown 0 1 1 0

Total 0 2 12 9 23

Per Page 0.00 0.27 1.85 3.00 1.03

59

Notes

Vicente Blasco Ibanez, Sanqre y arena, (Valencia: Premetee, 1919), 382.

J. E. Cirlet, Tr. Jack Sage, A Dictionary of Symbols, 2nd ed. (New York: Philosophical Library, 1971), 52.

^ John M. Haller, "The Semantics of Color," ETC.: A Review of General Semantics, XXVI,2 (1969), 202.

^ Concepcion Iglesias, Blasco Ibanez: Un novelista para el mundo, (Spain; Silex, 1985), 102.

^ It must be remembered that color is not just pigmenta­tion in this study; see pages 26-27 of chapter 3.

^ Donald A. MacKenzie, "Colour Symbolism," Folk-Lore, XXXIII,2 (1922), 152.

^ Herbert A. Kenyon, "Color Symbolism in Early Spanish Ballads," The Romance Review, VI,3 (1915), 332.

^ Dr. Wendell McClendon, in his article "Red on Gray: Therese Raquin," to be published in the Winter 1990-1991 edition of Nineteenth Century French Studies, says that; "On this analogy with painting, the 'background' includes data given to establish mood and to present characters. The 'foreground' includes character developments, actions, and events occurring against the background. The themes emerge from the interaction of background and foreground."

CHAPTER V

COLOR ANALYSIS OF

LOS CUATRO JINETES DEL APOCALIPSIS

Los cuatro iinetes del Apocalipsis details don Mar-

cele Desnoyers' childhood and life in Argentina. The

protagonist inherits great wealth at the death of his

father, but has to divide it with his only sister and her

German husband who use the money to move to, and live in,

Germany. Responding to the constant bickering of his own

wife, who is jealous of his sister's living in Europe, he

packs up his family and moves to France, where he buys a

castle. His son refuses to live a "normal" life and, in­

stead, becomes a painter. At the outbreak of the "Great

War" Desnoyers feels guilty because of his inability to

defend his adopted country, France. Consequently, he

goes "to fight" by leaving Paris (to where he had re­

cently moved) and returning to his castle.

This castle happens to be strategically located near

the Marne River and is used as a field hospital by the

Germans after they overrun the region. Desnoyers is

present at the time, meets one of his German nephews, new

a captain in the opposing army, and stays until the

French, or Allies, recapture the castle. Afterwards, he

returns to Paris, having completed his "tour of duty." A

60

61

few days later his own sen, now repentant for not

fighting, comes to visit him, telling him that he is

leaving for the front; Desnoyers instructs him, "—Tal vez

encuentres frente a ti rostros cenocides. La familia no

se forma siempre a nuestro gusto. Hombres de tu sangre

estan al etro lade. Si ves a algune de ellos. . . no

vaciles, jtira! es tu enemigo. iMatalo . . . imatale!"^

The passage for analysis from Los cuatro iinetes del

Apocalipsis was chosen because it contains in the space of

a few pages suspense, characterization, plot, localiza­

tion, climax and a denouement. Moreover, this passage

easily divides itself into three sections which, while net

independent of one another, can be examined, with enlight­

ening results, separately in detail. This examination

employs the same criteria of color classification used in

the analysis of Sanqre y arena; The method involves a

reading of the selected passage, annotation of the color

references, and a systematic classification of these

elements into their own respective categories.

In Les cuatro iinetes del Apocalipsis, Blasco Ibanez

again limits himself to the use of a specific number of

different color references, at least as observable in the

three divisions of the portion analyzed. However, instead

of using only eight color types in each division, he uses

eleven. These include the five with which Blasco Ibanez

62

painted images in Sanqre v arena: white, black, gray, red

and yellow. Other colors employed in this mere complex

manipulation of chromes are clearness, brightness, green,

blue and brown. In addition to these ten colors or color

attributes each section of the reading passage portrays

one other element in its development, a color allusion

which occurs only once.

In the first division of the passage, one reads of

don Marcelo's emergence from his cellar, to where the

Germans had banished him, his trek through the German-

pillaged town, and his deciding he must live in order to

see vengeance poured out on the enemy; in this section

blurriness is the solitary, unrepeated element. Section

two, depicting the German retreat—or defeat—from the

castle grounds, contains a single violet. And the third

part, again involving travel—this time den Marcelo's

leaving behind his castle and journeying by foot and taxi

back to Paris—alludes to a single blurriness.

Blurriness, then, only occurs twice in the novel:

"Les cadaveres habian desaparecide (from the streets),

pero un hedor nauseabunde de qrasa decempuesta, de carne

quemada, parecia agarrarse a las fesas nasales" (288,

emphasis added) and once in section three as: "Un hedor

de grasa descempuesta per la muerte arano su (Marcelo's)

elfate" (310). The violet occurs in the battle at the

63

castle: "Mas alia unes artilleres que estaban dereches

aparecian subitamente tendides e inmoviles, embadurnades

de purpura" (302). As noted in Table 3, all ether colors,

except orange and indigo—which are net present, appear

at least twenty-one times in the passage.

Another important difference between the two novels

studied is that instead of only averaging 6.46 color ele­

ments per page, as in chapter 10 of Sanqre v arena, the

author employs 14.53 in the passage from Los cuatro iine­

tes del Apocalipsis, i.e., the latter half of the chapter

entitled "La batalla del Marne." Here Blasco Ibanez

paints with almost two and a half times more color refe­

rences per page than in the 1908 novel, and by doing such

the author is able to achieve much more subtle and complex

coloring effects.

As may be anticipated given the plot structure with

its weaponry and casaulties, many color elements in "La

batalla" are of the brightness classification. Indeed

18.58% involve brightness, primarily because this element

entails the subset of the metals; revolver, bala, baye­

neta, canones, hez, etc. However, words such as reqie

esplender, redaias brillantes, fulqer, "estallide de les

projectiles franceses" (303), etc., also are subsumed in

this referent's make-up. Of these elements 71.23% occurs

in the second division of the analyzed passage—the German

64

retreat from, and the French invasion of, the castle and

its territory. These include, among others: "(U)n

estrepito de caballos, de maquinas rodantes paso la verja"

(296); "A lo large sonaba el canon, y en el intervale de

sus detonacienes un chasquido de tralla, un burbujee de

aceite frito, un crujir de moline de cafe, el crepita-

miente incesante de fusiles y ametralladoras" (297), and

the German response, "Un canon acababa de disparar a pecos

pases de el [Marcelo].... Solo entonces se die cuenta

de que dos baterias se habian instalado en su parque"

(298). Many other instances of brightness in this divi­

sion, fifty-seven in all, with approximately 13.07% of

all the color references in the selected portion of "La

batalla" appearing in less than one-half of the passage in

only one color type. Through this abundant and variegated

colorization Blasco Ibanez ensures that the defeat of the

Germans is seen as a bright occasion.

This second division of the chapter contains the

greatest average frequency of color elements per page—

15.38. The most common elements besides these of inten­

sity are gray, white, and brown, comprising 52% of the

strictly color group. The most numerous of these three is

gray, with thirty-three occurrences. Many of these pro­

vide information and hueing of the background: "El sol

era una mancha tenue al rementarse entre telones de bruma"

65

(298); "se disolvieren las brumas matinales" (299), and

"(s)urgian de la niebla colinas y bosques, frescos y

cherrenates despues de la ablucion matinal" (299).

However, gray does play a role in the foreground as well:

"Se adivinaba[n]. . . las columnas de humo que surgian en

varies puntos del paisaje" (298). In the midst of battle

"un chorro de pelvo. . . obscurecio el cielo" (301). And

when Marcelo views the battle scene he sees a dead officer

whose "piernas grises con sus polainas habian quedado en

el suele" (302).

Brown, another of the four elements which individ­

ually compose eleven, or mere, percent of the second

division's coloring, occurs primarily in the foreground.

Seme of these are net delineated in the following quotes,

but are implied, and understood, in the larger context of

the chapter. One soldier told Marcelo, concerning the

ranking German official at the scene, that "[the soldier]

lo habia visto en el suele rugiendo de dolor" (295). "Un

batallon de infanteria se habia esparcido a lo largo de

las tapias" (297, emphasis added). "Les arboles lleraban

por todas las aristas de sus certezas" (298) before the

battle, and a few minutes later "volaron per el aire copas

enteras de arboles, varies trences partides en dos. . . .

Algunas piedras redaren del mure" (301). Shades of brown

appear quite frequently—it is the second-most frequent

66

color in "La batalla" in depicting the destruction and

consequences that war and fighting have en net only

mankind, but also on nature itself.

White, the fourth of the four most common colors, is

the third most common color element of this section and is

similiar to brown in that it is found primarily in the

portrayal of the foreground. Twenty-one of these thirty

occurrences are in reference to the castillo; the remain­

der describe primarily the destruction of man and the

upsetting of nature. The author also employs this color

to underscore evidence that the pretensions of the Germans

are false; they had set up a "bandera blanca y reja" (298)

signifying that the castle and its grounds were a Red

Cross base instead of a make-shift fort. Marcelo "volvio

les ojos con insistencia a la bandera blanca y reja que

ondeaba sobre el edificie. 'Es una traicion,' penso,

'iuna deslealtad!'" (298) The French sent a small spy-

plane to verity the truth, and "el avion frances se habia

inmevilizade unes instantes sobre el castillo, no pres-

tando atencion a las burbujas blancas que estallaban

debajo y en terno de el" (300). For the defense, "unes

armaban la bayeneta palidos," (307) but the French and

their allies couldn't be restrained. The latter started

pouring over the walls, "y revueltes con ellos, en el

desorden de la carga, [were] tiraderes africanes con ojos

67

de diablo y becas espumeantes" (308). White, then, is

used by Blasco Ibanez in the portrayal of both armies.

The author, then, uses white as a symbol of "despair and

even ill fortune"^ in an inversion of the symbolic import

of a normally perceived "good" color to underscore net the

merit of one side, but the destructiveness of war in

general.

This "reversal" of conventional connotations of white

in the painting of the author's thesis is not surprising,

even though traditional use is made of the darker elements

of the light wave—black, indigo, and violet—which are

present principally only in death, such as sepulcre or

incendiades. There are no indigos and, as previously

noted, only one violet, in comparison to twenty-four in­

stances of black, of which seven concern the noche, and

another "las espirales negras que elevaban les grandes

preyectiles al estallar en el suele" (299). Other

examples include the spy-plane, concerning which "ne "

podia imaginarse las dos cruces negras en el interior de

sus alas" (300), while during the battle, "(v)olaren per

el aire. . . terrenes negres" (301), and Marcelo saw his

castle, new split in two by a bomb, se that "(d)e les

hordes pendian trezes de madera [and] pedazes bambe-

leantes de pavimento" (310, emphasis added). A little

later, after the conflict defused, Marcelo observed the

68

defeated Germans emerging from "las habitacienes en

ruinas, de las profundidades de las cuevas, de les mate-

rrales del parque, de les establos y qareqas incendiades"

(310). Notwithstanding the author's partisanship, neither

this section, nor the characters in general, are se

blackened with dark colors that they appear to be

reprobates; the Germans are not unreconcilably "evil,

wrongdoing . . . [and] loathsome."^ Rather, the blacks

primarily function to create setting and mood, painting

the background against which the attrocities occur. The

circumstances, or war itself, is bad, not the bystanders

caught up in the obedience to their country's mandates and

actions.

The coloring in this second division, however, is net

all white, black, gray or brown. Red, yellow, green and

blue are interspersed within the text, providing a variety

of tones and complexions. Perhaps surprisingly, however,

only one instance of bleed appears: Marcelo was looking

at the German lieutenant when "(d)esapareci6 de pronto la

cabeza del eficial: dos surtideres de sangre saltaren de

su cuello y el cuerpe se desplemo" (307). When the flood

of invaders came, "aparecieren kepis rejos. . . . Desno­

yers ne supe con certeza come se realize la mutacion. De

pronto vio les pantalenes rejos dentro del parque" (308).

The ether reds appear in connection with "bandera de la

69

Cruz Roja" (297), a wounded soldier "mostrande entre les

desgarrones de la tela carnes sueltas, azules y rejas"

(302), and "el fuege de la artilleria" (306), among

others. The other warm color, yellow, appears primarily

as the sol, or luz in the sky. It also occurs, however,

as the "nubes amarillentas que flotaban en el aire" (298)

by which the invader's position was determined, as well

as "pavoresos rugidos envueltos en vapores amarillentes"

(300), and in connection with the German officer with "el

bigote ruble y corto" (302). The greens denote the arbo­

les, heias, and hierba; likewise, the blue is implicitly

or explicitly splashed sporadically across the foreground

in association with words such as rio, laquna and cielo.

These four colors then play their role not so much in the

mood and setting of the story as in the individual parts

which combine to create the sum total of the picture of

war and degradation as presented by Blasco Ibanez.

The third division of the passage offers the second

highest frequency of color elements per page—14.2. Even

though den Marcelo is leaving behind his castle at the

Marne and traveling back to Paris, reflective brightness

is still the most frequent element—25.35%. Now, though,

instead of the metallics being bright and gleaming in­

struments of destruction, they are less shiny, with many

destroyed and of no use. This dulling effect of the

70

brightness is achieved through the juxtaposition of adjec­

tives or other qualifiers and the color words, as may be

observed on several occasions: Marcelo "(v)i6. . . cascos

con melenas de crines, sables retorcidos, bayonetas rotas,

fusiles, montones de cartuchos de canon" (311). On down

the road, "(e)ncontr6 canones volcados con las ruedas

rotas. . . [y] armenes de preyectiles convertidos en

madejas retorcidas de barras de acero" (311).

Of the strictly color elements in the third section,

black occurs in 20.83%, brown 20.83%, and red 18.75% of

the instances of usage. Brown, which ties with black as

the most frequent of the three, occurs primarily in the

depiction of the background: "Parecia que la tierra

hubiese vomitado todos los cuerpos que llevaba recibidos"

(311); "Les [cadaveres] que [Marcelo] encontro al etro

lade del rio llevaban dos dias sobre el terrene; luego

tres, luego cuatro" (311); "Bandas de cuervos. . . volvian

a posarse en tierra" (312), and "(j)unte a los pueblos en

ruinas las mujeres remevian la tierra abriendo fesas"

(312). However, brown does splatter the foreground as

well: "Vehicules de artilleria con las maderas censumidas

. . . revelaban el tragico memento de la voladura. Rec-

tangules de tierra apisenada marcaban el emplazamiento de

las baterias enemigas" (311). After having gotten a drink

from a creek because he was thirsty, Marcelo lifted his

71

head and "vio unas piernas verdes que emergian de la

superficie liquida, hundiendo sus betas en el barro de la

orilla" (312). In this section Blasco Ibanez uses brown

not simply to convey the destruction of nature by war, but

to depict how man destroys himself in battle while nature,

though injured, is still "obstinate"^ and will somehow

endure.

Black, the ether most frequent strictly-color element

in section three, is used primarily to paint foreground

events, in spite of the two in-passing mentions of the

noche. During his trip by feet back to Paris, Marcelo

sees "cones de materia carbenizade que eran residues de

hombres y caballos quemades" (311), as well as "(l)os

pueblos, las granjas, las cases aisladas, todo quemade"

(312). Further along in his walk he comes across the

tavern where he had stepped to eat on the way to the

front: "Penetro entre les mures hollinados, y un enjam-

bre de moscas pegajesas vino a zumbar en terno de su cara

. . . . Una pierna que parecia de carton chamuscado

asemaba entre les escembres" (312). This constant

repetition of black on the foreground depicts the ultimate

in death, destruction, waste, and desolation, as well as

"horrible and powerful beings invisible" (Haller 202).

Thus, the author is able mere graphically and starkly to

portray war's tragedy.

72

Red, sometimes combined with black, is used to

describe the actions and events in the third division.

Again, there are the "kepis rejos" (311), and the implicit

ruddy glow of hellfire: when he was asked upon arriving

in Paris from where he had come, "'Del infierno,' murmuro

don Marcelo" (314). Two days later his son comes to tell

him that he has decided to go fight, and the first thing

Marcelo notices is that the "kepis era de un rojo" (314).

In his advice to the boy he tells his sanqre (314) that

"(h)ombres de tu sangre estan al etro lade" (315). Red,

then, is net employed as one would probably expect in a

war novel—simply by the insistent, constant pulsating use

of sanqre. "La batalla" contains only seven variations or

uses of that particular word, even though "los cadaveres

de una y etra parte eran infinites, no tenian limite"

(311), and only four of these are violent, or imply the

shedding of bleed. By restricting his use of "bleed" and

employing shadings of red in this less violent and unster-

eotyped manner, Blasco Ibanez manipulates the colors so

as to net have simply another stereotyped, hemorrhaging

war-novel.

The remaining 33.80% of the color elements in the

third section are divided among the seven other color

types. The whites appear in Marcelo's references to his

castle: "lAdios, castillo de Villablanche!" (310) The

73

one blurriness occurs, as already seen, when he enters the

now destroyed bar: "Un hedor de grasa descempuesta per la

muerte arano su elfate" (312). One of the two greens is

actually an absence—"Encontro cadaveres per todas partes;

pero estos no vestian el uniforme verdose"(310)—while the

other involves the "piernas verdes que emergian de la su­

perficie liquida" (312) that Marcelo had steeped to drink.

As with the three previous colors, yellow also is a part

of the foreground, and all occur during Marcelo's trip

back heme: "El sol, impasible, poblaba de puntos de luz,

de fulgores amarillentes los campos de muerte" (311). The

grays and clearnesses, mentioned primarily in passing, are

of ne great importance. The blue is of a little mere

value, calling attention to four bodies of water: rio,

aqua, arrove, and laquna, and in one case "vientres abier-

tos que dejaban escapar higades enermes y azules" (311).

These last seven colors—blue, gray, yellow, clearness,

green, white and blurriness, comprising almost two-thirds

of the color types employed, total only one-third of the

color occurences in this division of the analyzed passage.

Black, red, brown, and brightness alone form 66% of the

colors in this section.

Through the varied tones selected for backgound por­

trayal of a moment when the heat of battle has subsided,

Blasco Ibanez subtly conveys a feeling that things are

74

looking up, or at least net looking down, even though the

most frequently used colors may not be the "happiest."

This is emphasized by the fact that during den Marcelo's

trip back to Paris (progressively further from war),

31.25% of the ele-ments in the strictly color category and

63.16% of the light wave elements involve warm colors,

with another 10.53% of the latter category being of

intermediate heat intensity. Thus, in spite of all the

destruction which don Marcelo witnesses, "the processes of

assimilation, activity, and intensity"^ are clearly pre­

dominant. Away from the evils of war, mankind and nature

somehow survive and hope remains.

In the first segment with 13.22 color elements per

page, definites dominate. That is, 32.77% of the color

elements are either black or white. "El cadaver de un

cisne flotaba," and over the same water drifted "unes

bullenes blances"(287), while "(s)oldades formande parejas

llevaban objetos envueltos en sabanas" (291). Still

another of the whites is present when Marcelo has to buy

his own food from the German conquerors: "A la mafiana

siguiente el sanitario le esperaba en el mismo sitie con

una servilleta llena [of food]" (293). The blacks, ex­

pressed and implied, are stark and graphic: On walking

through the torched village Marcelo sees ne one "en sus

calles, sembradas de botellas, de maderas chamuscados, de

75

cascotes cubiertos de hollin. Les cadaveres habian desa­

parecide, pero un hedor nauseabunde. . . de carne quemada

[remained]" (288). And when compelled by the Germans to

help dig a mass-grave, Marcelo "(v)olvi6 los ejes para ne

ver les cadaveres rigidos y grotesces que asomaban sobre

su cabeza, al borde del hoyo, prentos a derramarse en el

fondo de este" (293). At least eight occurrences of noche

and nocturne are projected net upon the foreground, as are

most of the white and black references in section one, but

on the background.

The two categories of gray and blurriness combined

only yield 8.40% of the color elements in this division in

which don Marcelo emerges from his cellar, travels through

the town and decides he must live in order to see revenge

poured out en the Germans. Highlighting his decision are

six occurrences each of both clearness and brightness

which outweigh the single blurriness: the texture of the

"grasa descempuesta" (288). The grays include, among

others: "las telaranas colgantes" (286) in Marcelo's

cellar, the "cuerpos infermes rematades per una testa que

hablaba y fumaba" (290) while being transported to the

"hospital," and the "camienes grises" (294) that served

as ambulances bringing the wounded from the battlefield.

However impressive these instances may seem to be, appro­

ximately three times their frequency is observed in the

76

mere definite, and thought-provoking categories of white

and black.

In this non-violent first passage of "La batalla"

89.08% of the color elements are devoted to the strictly

color group; indeed, 35.29% pertains to the light wave,

while in divisions two and three only 24.39 and 26.76%

respectively of the color references are of the light

wave. Pigmentation, then, plays a much greater role, and,

thus, a stronger implied condemnation of warfare in gen­

eral is provided in this first section.

The general mood of this first division is best

defined as noncommittal (existentially). The primary

background colors—those which set the meed—are prin­

cipally green or brown. Of the sixteen browns, one-half

are references to the tierra, another being suele, and yet

another, barro. Net all the browns, however, are back­

ground—as demonstrated by mentions of roca, ramas secas

and trenco. The greens, on the ether hand, are primarily

foreground, embodied either in the green arboles, plantas

acuaticas, or "el valle, ruble y verde, senriendo baje el

sol" (287) before the French counter-attack occurs.

Blasco Ibanez employs these two colors to picture hew war

affects nature, as well as man. War's seen effects are

visible via the intermediate color green, which is the

representation of "sympathy and adaptability" (Cirlet

77

54), as violence tends to disrupt, destroy or annhilate

this coloring.

With 56.60% of the strictly color references of the

first section net being warm, only 43.40% of these

elements remain for character development and for pres­

entation of actions and events. In short, the reader

laments what has happened to don Marcelo, the other castle

tenants and the village folk, but also sees how don Marce­

lo struggles and continues on.

Blasco Ibanez also manifests his desire for the

defeat of the Germans in the last part of section three.

This one-page description portrays don Marcelo praising

his sen (whom he formerly did not allow in his presence)

for joining the military. Only one of the light wave

elements selected is not warm, and even that one has a

positive effect: "jQue hermoso le veia!. . . El kepis

era de un rojo obscurecido por la mugre." (314) All ether

color allusions are red, and the one implied black is

tempered by red. Thus, while den Marcelo is telling his

son to go fight the Germans, even if they are relatives,

Blasco Ibanez consciously manipulates coloring to sub-

liminally reinforce the idea that the Germans need to be

defeated.

Blasco Ibanez's general coloring technique applied to

the Germans is quite interesting. As shewn by Table 4,

78

the largest color classification used to portray the Ger­

mans is brightness; of these references, a full 60% are

words of weaponry, such as revolver, canon, fusiles or

bayeneta. Another 17.12% of the total color references

employ brown and are generally related to the soil, in­

cluding, among others, tierra, barro and suele. The

passage totals are: of the color elements referring

directly to the Germans, 31.51% are cold colors, while

another 11.64% are gray; only 26.03% are warm colors.

Approximately 70% of the "strictly colors" modifying the

Germans, then, is not warm. Through such use of color

symbolism, Blasco Ibanez urges the reader to regard the

Germans as representative of "dissimilation. . . debil­

itation" (Cirlet 52), "egoism [and] depressionism. . ."

(Cirlet 54) The result is clearly net a pretty picture of

the Germans—as can be seen even without analysis of other

writing techniques used by Blasco Ibanez besides the use

of colors.

Although the most frequent coloring of the French

soldiers also involves brightness, only 48.15% of such

references allude to weaponry. The authors's sympathies

are reflected in the fact that the French are represented

by 10% fewer cold colors than the Germans, and the browns

make up only 8.57%, instead of 17.12%, of the total

colors. Blasco Ibanez's condemnation of war dees net

79

prevent his distinguishing degrees of culpability, and

thus color is manipulated so that the French are less

negatively portrayed than are the Germans.

However, the one character of the three primary areas

of narrative focus (the Germans, the French, and den Mar­

celo Desnoyers) with the largest percentage—32.52%—of

warm coloring is Desnoyers. He, although being the pri­

mary focus of the narrative, is net "colorful;" in fact,

none of the "characters" is pintoresco. At the same time,

somewhat paradoxically, Desnoyers has the highest per­

centage of cool colors—36.14%. Consequently, he is both

an assimilator and dissimilator—warm and cold colors

respectively. He is the former by his knowing for what to

fight but the latter by his methodology, or actual doing

of it. Despite the mixture of warm and cool, he is not

noncommittal; only 2.41% of his coloring is green—the

intermediate, neutral, or non-acting color. Whereas with

the Germans the primary warm coloring is white, and with

the French it is white and red, with Desnoyers this warm

coloring comes mainly from white and yellow. Thus, net

only may he represent "an allusion to the paradisiac isles

which man has lest" (Cirlet 342), but also he may also

embody "intuition and intellect" (Cirlet 54). As an al­

legorical character of limited import, he represents the

implicit understanding of what should be dene in the

80

situation, but not necessarily the model to be followed or

imitated.

The procedure of combining gray and green, and then

comparing the result with the corresponding use of warm

and cold colors reveals the author's underlying feelings

toward the three main characters (or composite charac­

ters). As shown in Table 4, the Germans are portrayed

via the combination of 26.03% warm, 31.51% cold, and

21.92% gray/green (the remaining percentage being

"intensity"). The French are painted as 22.86% warm,

21.43% cold, and 14.29% gray/green. Marcelo Desnoyers,

however, is 32.52% warm, 36.14% cold, and 10.84% gray/

green. Although the Germans and French are approximately

equally warm, the Germans are significantly more negative.

While it may seem that Desnoyers is the coldest, it must

be remembered that he is approximately equal in hot and

cold attributes, and his coloration includes much less

noncommittal neutral coloring than that of either the

Germans or the Allies.

Whatever his personal dislike for war (and in this

case his sympathy for the victims of aggression parallels

his compassion for the animals in the bullfight), Blasco

Ibanez never lost sight of the causes or motivations in

conflict. At any cost, therefore, the Germans must be

defeated; the cause of the Allies must prevail. Blasco

81

wants everyone to be committed, cemprometido. In the best

words possible, the words of the protagonist himself:

"(N)o vaciles, jtira! es tu enemigo. jMatalo! . . .

jmatalo!" (315), which is exactly the mood that Blasco

produces with the coloration. The hueing dictates that

necessity, showing that the warmest "character" is the

only one who can issue the command and reveal the bad, or

negative, points of the opposition.

82

Table 3: Color Analysis of Les cuatro iinetes del Apocalipsis

Section Color I II III Total % of Total

White 18 30 3 51 11.70

Black 21 24 10 55 12.61

Gray 9 33 6 48 11.01

Clearness

Blurriness

Brightness

Red

Orange

Yellow

Green

Blue

Indigo

Violet

6

1

6

10

0

18

10

4

0

0

14

0

57

16

0

10

21

12

0

1

4

1

18

9

0

3

2

5

0

0

24

2

81

35

0

31

33

21

0

1

5.50

0.46

18.58

8.03

0.00

7.11

7.57

4.82

0.00

0.23

Brown 16 28 10 54 12.39

Total 119 246 71 436 100.01

Per Page 13.22 15.38 14.20 14.53

83

Table 4: Color Analysis of Les cuatro iinetes del Apocalipsis: Characterization Coloring

Color Germans French Marcelo # % # % # %

White 21 14.00 7 10.00 12 14.46

Black 15 10.00 6 8.57 16 19.28

Gray 17 11.33 7 10.00 7 8.43

Clearness 4 2.67 2 2.86 8 9.64

Blurriness 0 0.00 0 0.00 1 1.20

Brightness 30 20.00 27 38.57 8 9.64

Red 11 7.33 7 10.00 4 4.82

Orange 0 0.00 0 0.00 0 0.00

Yellow 6 4.00 2 2.86 11 13.25

Green 15 10.00 3 4.29 2 2.41

Blue 5 3.33 3 4.29 7 8.43

Indigo 0 0.00 0 0.00 0 0.00

Violet 1 0.67 0 0.00 0 0.00

Brown 25 16.67 6 8.57 7 8.43

Total 150 100.00 70 100.01 83 99.99

84

Notes

^ Vicente Blasco Ibanez, Les cuatro iinetes del Apocali-sis (Valencia; Premetee, 1916), 315.

2 w. L. Fichter, "Color Symbolism in Lope de Vega," The Romantic Review XVIII,3 (1927), 227.

3 John M. Haller, "The Semantics of Color," ETC.; A Review of General Semantics XXVI,2 (1969), 202.

^ Faber Birren, Liqht, Color and Environment (New York: Van Nestrand Reinhold, 1969), 31.

^ J. E. Cirlet, Tr. Jack Sage, A Dictionary of Symbols, 2nd. ed. (New York: Philosophical Library, 1971), 52.

CONCLUSION

Color, as used in this study, and as evinced in

Blasco Ibanez's works, does not signify solely "hue" but,

rather, any word which connotes or evokes chromatic imag­

ery. This chromatic imagery, although certainly not the

only literary device this author uses, is an important

part of the two novels Sanqre y arena and Les cuatro ii­

netes del Apocalipsis. Having examined the coloring

effects of each of the two works, one may draw several

conclusions. The novelist's use of color is central to

the narrative. Its functions range from aiding in charac­

terization to creation of mood, from foreshadowing of a

future event to advancement of the action, per se. Blas­

ce's use of color is so pervasive that it is difficult to

imagine these novels without it. Certainly, the vividness

and brilliant coloration of the works analyzed played a

major role in their extraordinary popular success.

One interesting aspect of this novelist's coloring

techniques is his mixing of colors. In Sanqre y arena,

the earlier novel, Blasco Ibanez paints his characters and

plot, in short his themes, primarily en a background of

yellow. The texture and hue of the sand etch themselves

onto the painter's canvas se much that they become the

canvas itself. The intuition symbolized by yellow seems

85

86

to form the basis of all major actions and events.

However, this is not exactly the case; the yellow is

blotched out by the foreground, or the events, which

actually serve to conceal that reasoning. As noted in

Table 1, the most frequent color element is red, which

occurs principally in the foreground. The emotions of

red, then, do cause the novel to advance, contaminating

the intellect and aiding in the author's thesis of the

condemnation of bullfighting.

This red element, as well, demonstrates the inten­

tional manipulation by the author of colors: Contrary to

what a reader would normally expect, "blood" is only in­

frequently found in this novel of gorings and stabbing-

deaths. In fact, less than one-third of the red elements

are sanqre, or variations of that word, and more than 76%

of these appear before page 385, when the "bad bull" en­

ters the ring. The other blood references—only one of

which refers to Juan's injury—occur on pages 393 and 394,

when Juan falls gored and the subsequent events. In the

interval, during Juan's actual fight of the bull and his

being gored, there are no occur-rences of sanqre; instead,

these are replaced by seven red references alluding to the

capote. The fight becomes a mere concrete, bounded action

instead of a free-flowing abstraction which it had been.

The red is not used simply as a gory detailing of bleed-

87

letting, but rather as a waving and turning foreground

attraction which aids in the concealing of the intellec­

tual background.

But concealing or obscuring the background is net the

only coloring effect that Blasco Ibanez uses in the 1908

novel. Another is foreshadowing, of which Carmen is a

prime example. She, like the death angel, is dressed all

in black and is coming for Juan, while at the same time

foreshadowing her widowhood.

Juan, unlike his wife, is described in many colors,

only 9% of which are cold. He stands out, even though

performing his duty on the same background of yellow. His

constant covering, or neglect, of the intellect, however,

leads to his demise, and death. Blasce's mixing of colors

in Sanqre y arena, or more exactly, the individual stand­

out function of each color in this novel, primarily shews

that the gaudiness and impiety of bullfighting only cam­

ouflages or obliterates true reason and, thus, ultimately

leads to death.

Blasce's mixing of the colors encountered in Les cua­

tro iinetes del Apocalipsis (1916), en the other hand, is

much more complex. Blasco Ibanez, at the time of this

writing, had eight more years of experience in color mani­

pulation, and, as well, there are three, instead of two,

principal points of narrative focus or "characters" in the

88

latter novel: the French and the Germans (composite

characters), and don Marcelo Desnoyers. What is most

interesting in the World War II novel is the marked in­

crease in color usage: The author pencils in almost 2.3

times the number of color references per page while em­

ploying 3 more color types per section.

In the latter novel, as in the former, Blasco Ibanez

deliberately downplays the flow of sanqre: Less than

11.5% of the reds are variations of that word: instead,

this referent is primarily found in descriptions of the

Red Cross and the French troops. Whereas in Sanqre y

arena red is used in a negative manner to portray the au­

thor's thesis, in Los cuatro iinetes del Apocalipsis, this

color both demonstrates the negative—deception by use of

innocence, and the positive—the recenquest by the French.

The fact that both novels involve incidents which are in­

herently bloody and gory (and which a lesser writer might

have easily ever-emphasized) makes it amply clear that

Blasco consciously controlled and limited these elements,

combining them with ether deliberately chosen touches of

color to achieve the desired composite artistic effect.

If, as seme have suggested, Les cuatro iinetes del

Apocalipsis is a condemnation of war, color analysis

makes clear that the author intends an even greater con­

demnation of the German forces. The Germans have the

89

largest non-warm percentage of the three main "charac­

ters": 54% The French comprise the smallest non-warm

character 35%. Marcelo, on the other hand, shews the

largest use of yellow, logically so, as he symbolizes in­

tellect—serving as spokesman for the author's belief that

one should do one's duty by first fighting and then re­

nouncing the entire military mind-set. Actions are

eloquent in the case of Marcelo who did not fight except

to protect his own property, after which he quickly re­

treated back into civilian life. Marcelo dees have mere

thinking colors—yellow and blue—than the others.

Coloring, then, is an important aspect of these two

Blasco Ibanez novels. It permits more complex character

motivation and cannily exploits the fact that colors de

affect the way in which a character is perceived. Repre­

senting two different time periods, as well as styles, of

the author's writings, these two works clearly demonstrate

the progress and increasing complexity of Blasco Ibanez's

manipulation of color symbolism through greater utiliza­

tion in the latter. Colors, both symbolically and en mere

literal levels, play a major role in the presentation of

the two novels, and the variety of ways in which color is

employed provides clear evidence that Blasco Ibanez's

narratives include mere art and artifice than has been

recognized heretofore.

WORKS CITED

Albers, Josef. Interaction of Color. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1971.

Bell, Aubrey. Contemporary Spanish Literature. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1933.

Birren, Faber. Liqht, Color and Environment. New York: Van Nestrand Reinhold, 1969.

Blasco Ibanez, Vicente. Los cuatro iinetes del Apocalip­sis. 3rd. ed. Valencia: Premetee, 1916.

"Blasco Ibanez, Vicente." World Book Encyclopedia. Chicago: Field Enterprises, 1958.

Sanqre y arena. Valencia; Premetee, 1919.

Chamberlin, Vernon. "Las imagenes animalistas y el color rojo en La barraca." Duquesne Hispanic Review. 6. October, 1967, pp. 23-36.

Cirlet, J. E. A Dictionary of Symbols. 2nd ed. Trans. Jack Sage. New York: Philosophical Library, 1971.

Conte, Rafael. "Vicente Blasco Ibanez; Lecciones de un centenario." Cuadernos Hispanoamericanos. No. 216 (1967), pp. 507-520.

Cuddon, J. A. A Dictionary of Literary Terms. New York; Viking Penguin, 1979.

Del Rio, Angel. Historia de la literatura espanola. Tome II. New York: Holt Rinehart and Winston, 1963.

Fichter, W. L. "Color Symbolism in Lope de Vega." The Romanic Review. XVIII,3 (1927), pp. 220-231.

Haller, John M. "The Semantics of Color." ETC.: A Re­view of General Semantics. XXVI,2 (1969), pp. 201-204.

Iglesias, Concepcion. Blasco Ibanez; Un novelista para el mundo. Spain: Silex, 1985.

90

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