Tristana

Benito Perez Galdos' inverted drama about a conflicted heroine attempting to escape provincial boredom--only to come crawling back home--absolutely emanates the singular vision of the author who inspired surrealist filmmakers and is considered by many Spain's greatest writer after Cervantes. Perez Galdos' depiction of the no-man's-land that was late 19th-century Spain will appeal to historical fiction fans as well as strictly literary readers.

An NYRB Classics Original Don Lope is a Don Juan, an aging but still effective predator on the opposite sex. He is also charming and generous, unhesitatingly contributing the better part of his fortune to pay off a friend's debts, kindly assuming responsibility for the friend's orphaned daughter, lovely Tristana. Don Lope takes her into his house and before long he takes her to bed. It's an arrangement that Tristana accepts more or less unquestioningly- that is, until she meets the handsome young painter Horacio. Then she actively rebels, sets out to educate herself, reveals tremendous talents, and soon surpasses her lover in her open defiance of convention. One thing is for sure- Tristana will be her own woman. And when it counts Don Lope will be there for her. Benito Perez Gald s, one of the most sophisticated and delightful of the great European novelists, was a clear-eyed, compassionate, and not-a-little amused observer of the confusions, delusions, misrepresentations, and perversions of the mind and heart. He is the unsurpassed chronicler of the reality show called real life.

Ideal for readers interested in general fiction.