1.

Record Nr.

UNINA9910460019703321

Autore

Viestenz William

Titolo

By the grace of God : Francoist Spain and the sacred roots of political imagination / / William Viestenz

Pubbl/distr/stampa

Toronto, [Ontario] ; ; Buffalo, [New York] ; ; London, [England] : , : University of Toronto Press, , 2014

©2014

ISBN

1-4426-6858-X

Descrizione fisica

1 online resource (236 p.)

Collana

Toronto Iberic ; ; 14

Disciplina

860.9/382

Soggetti

Spanish literature - 20th century - History and criticism

Religion and politics - Spain - History - 20th century

Religion and literature - Spain - History - 20th century

Electronic books.

Spain Politics and government 1939-1975

Lingua di pubblicazione

Inglese

Formato

Materiale a stampa

Livello bibliografico

Monografia

Nota di bibliografia

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Nota di contenuto

Frontmatter -- Contents -- Acknowledgments -- 1. Introduction: La España Sagrada as a Political Category -- 2. “He aquí una plenitud española”: Catholicism, Cultural Regeneration, and Spanish Essentialism -- 3. Politics by Other Means: The Sacred Core of Collective Imagining -- 4. Intimate Strife: Inside Juan Goytisolo’s Sovereign Exception -- 5. The Eternal Present of Sacred Time -- 6. “De-sacralization” and “Sacro-genesis,” or How to Step Outside of Sacred Time -- 7. Espriu’s Sepharad and the Equitable Restoration of Sacred Sovereignty -- 8. Conclusion: The Aesthetic Disruption of Political Truth -- Notes -- Works Cited -- Index

Sommario/riassunto

Though neither king nor priest, Spanish dictator Francisco Franco nevertheless conceptualized his right to sovereignty around a political theology in which national identity resembled a sacred cult. Using Franco’s Spain and la España sagrada as a counterpoint to European secularity’s own development, By the Grace of God is the first sustained analysis within Spanish cultural studies of the sacred as a political category and a tool for political organization.William Viestenz shows



how imagining national identity as a sacred absolute within a pluralistic, multicultural state leads to dictatorship, scapegoating, and exceptional violence. Using novels and poetry from the Catalan literary tradition and stalwarts of the Castilian canon, his analysis demonstrates that the sacred is a concept that spills over into key areas of secular political imagination.By the Grace of God offers an original theory of the sacred that challenges our understanding of twentieth-century political thought.