This 2017 translation of Miguel de Unamuno’s “Niebla” or “Fog” was originally published in 1914 in Spanish. Top notch translation here. The words and phrasing feel modern, not like I imagine English speakers spoke in the early 20th century, but that doesn’t detract from this piece. Unamuno is considered a Modernist writer and this text is filled with questions psychological and existential on the nature of being, reality, truth and how those are perceived. We see each other and even ourselves through a fog; perception is unclear. The framework for this is a rather simple love story (of course, the definition of love is questioned) with attendant drama and melodrama. The distinctly unmodern aspect of the story are some cringeworthy interactions between the male protagonist and women, which reek of outdated expectations of male/female behavior.

I would recommend to most readers to not let that dissuade you from reading “Fog”. There’s a lot of grist for the 21st century thinker. To illustrate, here are some quotes I found relevant to contemporary topics.

On life during an epidemic
“Do you know what that boor Martín Rubio said to poor Don Emeterio a few days after he lost his wife?”

“I don’t think I heard.”

“Well, listen. It was during the epidemic, you know? Everybody was terrified. You wouldn’t let me out of the house for days, and I had to drink boiled water. Everyone was avoiding everyone else, and if you saw someone dressed in black, it was as if they had the plague. So, five or six days after losing his wife, poor Don Emeterio had to leave his house. He was dressed in mourning, of course, and he ran into that lout, Martín.

When Martín saw that Don Emeterio was dressed in black, he stood a safe distance away, as if he was afraid he’d be infected and said, ‘What’s the matter? Has something happened at home?’ “‘Yes,’ poor Don Emeterio said, ‘I just lost my poor wife.’ “

On texting and written syntax
“Italics turn writers into mimes, replacing intensity and tone with gestures.”

On Climate Change Denial
“If some have mocked God, why shouldn’t we ridicule Reason, Science, and even Truth?”

On Gender Identity
“That’s why man invented clothes—to cover his sexual organs. But then, since both sexes wore the same clothes, they couldn’t tell each other apart. They couldn’t always tell what sex they were”…”At first, men and women wore the same garments, but since they couldn’t tell each other apart, they had to invent different clothing to reveal their gender.”

On state-sponsored socialism
“But as soon as Don Eloíno recovered from the shock, his friend made it clear that if he married the landlady, she would receive a widow’s pension of thirteen duros a month, which otherwise would be unclaimed and go to the state. So you see . . .”

“Yes, Victor, I know more than one person who’s gotten married to prevent the state from keeping his pension. That’s civic-mindedness for you.”

Personally interesting to me were the explorations of inner voice, what the protagonist called monologues. Our internal thoughts, the voice in our head. Unamumo even touches on what we might label mindfulness.

“Was there anything before books, before stories, before words, before thoughts?”

“I can’t live without debate and contradictions. And when there’s no one to debate and contradict me, I invent someone inside me to do it. My monologues are all dialogues.”

“As soon as we talk, we lie, and as soon as we talk to ourselves . . . I mean, as soon as we think, knowing that we’re thinking, we lie to ourselves. The only real truth is physiological. Words, these social constructs, were made for lying. In fact, I’ve heard one philosopher say that truth, like language, is also a social construct. Truth is what everybody believes, and in believing the same thing, we understand one another. Any social construct is a lie.”

“When a man lying motionless and asleep in his bed dreams something, what exists more, he as a consciousness that dreams or his dream?”

“…ridicule yourself, devour yourself. He who devours enjoys, but he worries so much about his pleasure coming to an end that he becomes a pessimist. He who is devoured suffers, but he focuses so much on the end of his torment that he becomes an optimist. Devour yourself, and since the pleasure of devouring yourself will become confused with and neutralized by the pain of being devoured, you’ll reach the state of perfect equanimity—ataraxy.”

(on receiving shocking news)
“He couldn’t think of anything to say. There was no monologue.”

(there is humor too)
“Don’t study medicine. It’s best not to know what’s inside you.”

And finally Orfeo, the dog, appropriately has the last word
“I taught him a lot with my silences, licking his hand while he talked and talked and talked.”

A philosophical novel, recently republished, with a sufficient dose of the fun factor to make it a pleasure for me. Unamuno was a leftist novelist, playwright, and essayist who served as a professor of Greek and Classics at the University of Salamanca. Written in 1907 and published in 1914, “Niebla” (translated as mist or fog) purports through one of its characters to represent a new form of fiction, called the “nivola”, which is concerned more with the personification of ideas than realism. It plays on proto-existentialist concepts such as the absurdity of the illusion of free will, the Shakespearean sense of our life as being like actors on a stage, and more ancient notions of our existence being but a dream by our God. The special and delightful twist comes when our main character, Augusto, recognizes Unamumo himself as the god-author responsible for his torments in seeking love. Thus, we get a foretaste of the over-the-top shenanigans I recently read in Pirandello’s play “Six Characters in Search of an Author” (published the same year as Ulysses, 1922), which in turn presages the “Theater of the Absurd”, which Beckett initiated in the 50s, as well as the intersections of characters, readers, and authors seen in Calvino’s “If on a winter’s night a traveler” (1979).

Recognizing this book as innovative does not prove it to be a fun read for contemporary readers. Let me paint the scenario a bit to help you see if it could be your cup of tea. We meet Augusto who is an aimless aristocrat. Strike one against our loving him. But he begins to charm us with his innocence and naivete and can readily appreciate his impetus to seek love to fill some of the emptiness he feels in life. A random encounter and glance with a woman on the street, Eugenia, leads him to follow her and then to dig information about her from the concierge at her residence. Strike two against him for stalking. But as he convinces himself he is in love with her and persuades her guardian aunt and uncle (a “theoretical anarchist”) of the virtues of his intentions, we begin to root for him much as we would for the fantasies of Don Quixote over Dulcinea. A windmill he must tilt at is that Eugenia is already engaged to marry. Maybe he is deluded, but his eloquence can be fetching:

"Thanks to love, I can feel my soul in a palpable way, I can touch it. The very core of my soul aches, thanks to love. And what is the soul if not love, if not the incarnation of pain?
…Days come and go and love remains. Deep within, in the innermost depths, this world’s current rubs and grates against the other world’s current, and from this rubbing and grating comes the saddest and sweetest heartache of all, the heartache of living."

As Augusto recognizes that only virtue can win the day for him, he bides his time while demonstrating selfless generosities to Eugenia. Meanwhile, the love awakened in his heart opens him to the susceptibility of falling in love with other women he encounters. The laundry girl, Rosario, catches his eye, and soon the dance of affection ensues between them. In his egocentric state of loving two women, Augusto seeks out advice from his writer friend Victor, framed as a quest to understand “feminine psychology.” He fills Augusto’s head with the notion from some 17th century doctor that women share a communal soul, that love is all in his head (“how do you know you are really in love and not just that you think you are?”), and that he should commit himself to the experiment of marrying either one immediately. To Augusto’s objection about the permanence of marriage, Victor is dismissive: "Anybody who wants to run an experiment with a way out, without burning bridges, will never attain any real knowledge."

I found myself engaged in a hit at the plate beating a strike-three count. What would be Augusto’s just fate? Just as he is about to take his fate into his own hands, we get the absurdity of him taking his case to the author. But the reader gets the last laugh. Victor has set up the idea of the reader’s power in this earlier dialogue with Augusto:
" 'All right, but what am I going to do right now?'
'Do…do…do! You’re already feeling like a character in a play or novel. …Aren’t we doing something when we talk like this? …As if talk were not action. In the beginning was the Word, and through the Word everything was created.'
…' The soul of a character in a play or a novel, or a nivola, is given to him by …'
'By his author.'
'No, by the reader.' "

A charming dessert at the end is an internal soliloquy by Augusto’s dog, Orfeo, who has had to put up with his master’s endless blather for so long. As a sliver of a sample of this perfect end to the tale, Orfeo concludes:
"Man is such a strange animal. …There is no way of knowing what he wants—if he himself even knows. …Language enables him to lie, to invent what doesn’t exist and get confused. …Man is a sick animal, no doubt about it."

This book was provided by the publisher for review through the Netgalley program.

Of Interest Even to the Non-Professional, or Non-Academic

"Fog", published in 1914, is widely acknowledged, in academic circles, to be an important early modernist novel, (if not indeed the earliest and the most important such novel). If you have a scholarly interest in modernism, the novel, literary theory, or Spanish culture and literary history, the book, and the author, will no doubt be known to you.

If you are not generally armored with such heady academic interests and distinction, the question becomes whether the book is of interest to a general reader. As a general reader myself, lacking entirely in professional credentials, I feel qualified to offer this humble opinion -- the book has its moments, and is much more lively, tender, and interesting than you might expect. Further, if you are willing to check the internet and read a little about Unamuno and to read a few reviews of this book, your appreciation of the book, enjoyment of the reading experience, and admiration of Unamuno, will be multiplied a hundredfold.

The book opens with an amusing foreword by a fictional personage. This forward is then rebutted by the author. The story then proceeds and we follow the life, and ultimately love life, of the foolish and delusional Don Augusto Perez. While Augusto is so shallow and simple that we begin to lose interest in him, he quickly is placed within many scenes and set up against many characters who have great presence, humor, and style. There is both gentle and biting humor, and I assume that some of the bits and lines would have been even more rewarding had I been more familiar with Spanish culture and politics of 1914. In any event, though, the book switches into an even higher gear when its modernist jokes and sensibility are brought into focus by the arrival of the author. Unamuno argues with his fictional creation Augusto, and the two engage in repeated back and forth discussions and arguments about fiction, the novel, reality, the responsibility of the author, Augusto's identity, and so on. This continues right up to the final pages of the novel, at which point the question of who is in control still seems an open point.

Of course, this could be heavy and tedious stuff. But, in this book it is not. The book subtly and explicitly draws comparison to Cervante's Don Quixote, and in one particular at least the comparison is especially apt - there is great humor, playfulness, serious intent, patience, compassion, and earnestness mixed into both books. This, above all, is what I would suggest makes the book of interest to a general, ambitious, and adventurous reader. A nice, unusual find.

(Please note that I received a free advance ecopy of this book without a review requirement, or any influence regarding review content should I choose to post a review. Apart from that I have no connection at all to either the author or the publisher of this book.)

Written in 1907 and first published in 1914, Miguel de Unamuno’s short novel, I am reliably informed, is a precursor of all the modernism and metafiction with which we have become all too familiar. Playfulness in novels is nothing new or exciting but it was new when Unamuno was writing and reading this gives a flavour of how exciting it must have been to readers at the time to discover a break from the traditional linear narratives of the 19th century and read a novel in which the author makes an appearance and in fact discusses the plot with the character he has invented. The story itself is a simple enough tale of a young wealthy man who sees a woman passing in the street and falls in love with her. His romantic plans don’t go quite according to plan and he has to consider suicide as an option. Although as he discovers when talking to the author, this isn’t his decision to make…..for he is just a character.
This is an interesting novel from a literary history point of view but also an amusing one in its own right, even if the reader doesn’t want to engage too much in the literary and authorial devices. It’s not too tricksy, and the blurring of fiction and reality doesn’t detract from the central narrative. Well worth reading.

Reading this book is like looking at an Escher drawing, every now and then the brain skips a beat when it tries to catch up on the layers: the story in the story, the author addressing the reader, the MC meeting the author etc. All of these perspectives are loosely set around a tragic love story. Even though it's sad, the prose feels incredibly light and very contemporary. This is a Spanish language classic that probably doesn't receive the attention that it deserves.

A beautiful translation of one of Unamuno's greatest works.

Stunning, enchanting, and absolutely captivating. Fog is a perfect package.

1914. Politically unsettling times at the onset of The Great War. Fragmentation in the world and a tendency to see through a glass darkly perhaps was the inspiration for "Fog" written by Miguel de Unamuno.

Augusto, a pampered, wealthy intellectual, still reeling two years after his mother's death, was bored with life. Bored, until the day he spotted a girl with beautiful eyes. He followed her home and gleaned the necessary information. She was single, orphaned, and lived with her aunt and uncle. Left almost destitute by her father after a stock market crash, she gave piano lessons to pay off the heavily mortgaged house she had inherited. Up until now, Augusto existed in a fog. He now had wild dreams about the undying love of his own creation.

Augusto, introverted and unsure of himself, confers with friend Victor. Victor tells him that Eugenia's presence has awakened Augusto's senses to women collectively. Feelings for a singular woman will help him to consider branching out and experiencing life and love. Augusto's "over the top" fascination with Eugenia is problematic since Eugenia has a fiance, Mauricio. Despite Mauricio's presence, Augusto is selfless. He pays off Eugenia's mortgage and eliminates her debts.

While Eugenia's aunt calls Augusto her favorite suitor, strong willed Eugenia is determined to marry lazy, unemployed Mauricio, a bum who detests the idea of work. She feels that Augusto is trying to "buy her".

The fog that is life envelopes Augusto. He converses with his dog Orfeo, who listens to his soliloquies and thoughts on love. Augusto wants to end his own life. He visits author Unamuno, his creator. Unamuno informs him that he is just a character in a novel and only an author can make life or death decisions for the characters.

"Fog" by Miguel de Unamuno is a tragic-comedy with existential themes. It is very creative and thought provoking. A most enjoyable tome.

Thank you Northwestern University Press and Net Galley for the opportunity to read and review "Fog".

This Modernist novel is surprisingly fun to read. And by “fun” I do not simply mean that it is “interesting” and “intellectually satisfying” (although it is that is well) but it is also seriously entertaining.

As in any self-respecting Modernist novel, the plot is secondary, if not inexistent. Bored bachelor Augusto Pérez has lost his doting mother who, before passing on, insisted that he find himself a wife. It takes the gaze of piano-teacher Eugenia to finally awake Augusto’s passions. There is a problem though - the wilful Eugenia is not particularly drawn to Augusto. Apart from the fact that she already has a fiancé. Moreover, thanks to Eugenia, Augusto’s eyes are finally open to the charms of women in general, and the ones who surround him in particular. Meaning that he is soon embroiled in a nascent affair with the earthier Rosario, the young woman who does his laundry. In between Augusto’s hapless attempts at lovemaking, he indulges in philosophical discussions and meta-fictional discourses with the other characters, which culminate in a showdown with the Author himself. Add a prologue purportedly written by one of Unamuno’s fictional characters, a “postprologue” by the author, and an epilogue by Augusto’s dog, and you have the makings of a Modernist text, a work which challenges preconceptions about the role of the author, his characters and his readers.

Even at his most abstruse, Unamuno retains and light and comic touch. Indeed, when not exploding novelistic conventions to smithereens, he indulges in a type of comedy which reminds me of early Evelyn Waugh. I particularly enjoyed the scenes involving Eugenia’s uncle - a self-declared “theoretical, mystical anarchist” who believes that Esperanto will bring about world peace.

I sincerely hope that Elena Barcia’s translation will bring this novel to the attention of a wider English-speaking (and reading) public. It deserves to be known not only for its literary-historical merits, but also – and perhaps more importantly – because it is such a great read.