Document Type

Article

Journal/Book Title/Conference

Decimonónica

Volume

15

Issue

1

Publisher

Decimonónica

Publication Date

2018

First Page

32

Last Page

49

Abstract

In La Regenta (1884-1885), the best-known and arguably the best work written by Leopoldo Alas or Clarín, gender expression and sexuality that diverge from societal convention pervade the novel, as many scholars have rightly pointed out.1 Indeed, the plot revolves around a love triangle between Ana, Fermín and Álvaro, all of whom are involved in sexually transgressive relations. Within this milieu fraught with heterosexual illicitness, characters who exhibit queer gender and sexual expression are silenced, made ambiguous, or revealed as one-dimensional figures by the narrator. Their queerness is for the most part not recognized or acknowledged by other characters. The narrator frequently mobilizes tropes of decadence and perversion in this novel, only then to hide away details regarding the non-normative characters that would enlighten the reader regarding their stories. In employing such a narrative voice, Leopoldo Alas adheres to literary convention by avoiding details that might have been considered distasteful to the Restoration reading public’s standards of decency.2 Hence narrative silences in the novel also eschew scenes of normative sexuality and privacy, as the scene at the end of Chapter 28 between Álvaro and Ana reveals. For the purposes of this paper, I will refer to narrative silences as indicative of Clarín’s effort to criticize a hypocritical bourgeois paradigm in which Spaniards exhibited normative behavioral standards in public but not necessarily in private.

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