EDUARDO MALLEA: BIOGRAPHY, STYLE AND WORKS - BIOGRAPHIES - 2025

Eduardo Mallea (1903-1982) was a diplomat, narrator, essayist and writer from Bahía Blanca, recognized today as one of the main writers of 20th century Argentine literature.

He studied Law for four years at the University of Buenos Aires. During this period, he took his first steps to publish his own writings with works such as Tales for a desperate Englishwoman in 1926 and European Nocturnal in 1934.

Mallea was characterized by writing short stories and essays. Photo: unknow. uploader Claudio Elias

Biography

His parents, both Argentine, were Narciso Segundo Mallea and Manuela Artiria. His father studied medicine in Buenos Aires and his first years as a doctor were developed in the Benito Juárez y Azul province.

Then he decided to move with his family to Bahía Blanca, where there was much more commercial activity, thanks to the proximity to the capital Buenos Aires. Around 1907, they made a trip to Europe and on their return (1910), Eduardo Mallea was enrolled in an English school.

Beginnings in writing

In 1927 he abandoned his studies in Law to be able to dedicate himself fully to writing, with a job as an editor in the newspaper La Nación, where he held the position as director of the literary supplement for many years.

He was in charge of the position of president in the Argentine Society of Writers (SADE), a job that he carried out together with his role as a diplomat representing Argentina before the European Office of the United Nations, as plenipotentiary minister.

Style

By 1940 his written work had an orientation towards what he was seeing at the national level. She wrote about the problems of her country, representing people as individuals with weak values, with a social life, focusing especially on the representation of the intangible within.

Eduardo Mallea represented in the vast majority of his works two realities that he wished to highlight to demonstrate his thinking. He sought to make it notable and interpret what for him was the spiritual crisis, at the same time in which he wanted to update the narrative to the new currents of content.

A decade after this stage, in 1950, his attention in reference to style focused on the narrative with short stories, together with the essay. The latter with an emphasis on the philosophical and sociopolitical, thanks to all the Peronist movement that it rejected.

He even came to be named as one of the creators of the urban novel, where he ventured out the frustrations of all the reality he faced, thus leaving his work as a testimony of a historical period for his country.

Plays

Due to the medical influence of his father, Eduardo Mallea took the academy as a great reference for his work. Several authors coincide in stating that the presence of encyclopedias and educational guides trained him in reading.

In 1916, when her family returned from their trip to Europe, Mallea began producing her first short stories. In 1920 he had the initiative to publish his first short story La Amazona. Then, in 1923 the newspaper La Nación published Sonata de Soledad of his authorship.

During his years of university studies, despite having abandoned them, he created the works Tales for a desperate Englishwoman (1926) and European Nocturnal (1934), sending a clear and forceful message that dispelled any doubt about his vocation: he was made for writing..

National Production

Once again, a journalism space opened the doors for him to show his talent, the Revista de Occidente published his novel La angustia (1932).

Through History of an Argentine Passion, Mallea made her position clear in relation to the social and moral situation her country was going through through her already known means of expression, the essay.

International impact

Demonstrating the scope to which it would reach, the Sur Magazine published its story Sumersión in Buenos Aires, a work that was also published in Deutsche Zuricher Zeitung in Zurich, and also in L'Italia Letteraria in Rome, forcefully transcending the borders of Argentina and consolidating it further of the airs of "literary promise" that it possessed in principle.

The cause of Jacobo Uber, lost (story) raised its internationalization to another level after its publication in Madrid, Spain, through the weekly Diablo mundo (“7 days of the world”). Later it was published in Argentina by the Sur Magazine.

Meanwhile, the short novel La Angustia was published in the Revista de Occidente in Madrid. Thanks to this type of international publications, Mallea began to have greater repercussion worldwide as a character in Latin American literature.

His talent came to be appreciated in great houses of study around the world, such as Princeton and Yale universities, where he was the star guest to give lectures to students.

In his honor, the Eduardo Mallea Special Prize is awarded, which recognizes unpublished works on topics related to Argentina or any other country in America in the narrative categories (novel and short story) and essay.

List of works

Tales for a desperate Englishwoman, 1926.

Knowledge and expression of Argentina (essay), 1935.

European nightlife. Buenos Aires, 1935.

The city by the immobile river (short novels), 1936.

History of an Argentine passion (essay), 1937.

Party in November (novel), 1938.

Meditation on the coast (essay), 1939.

The Bay of Silence (novel), 1940.

The Sackcloth and the Purple (essays), 1941.

All greenery will perish (novel), 1941.

Adiós a Lugones (essay), 1942 (It is included in El sackcloth and purple).

The Eagles (novel), 1943.

Surrounded by a dream ("Poetry memories of a stranger"), 1943.

The return (poetic narration), 1946.

The link, The Rembrandts, The rose of Cernobbio (short novels), 1946.

The enemies of the soul (novel), 1950.

The tower (novel), 1951.

Chaves (novel), 1953.

The waiting room (novel), 1953.

Notes of a novelist (essays), 1954.

Sinbad (novel), 1957.

The juniper segment (tragedy in three acts), 1957.

Possession (short novels), 1958.

The human race (stories), 1959.

White life (essay), 1960.

The Crossings (Essays), Volume 1 in 1962, Volume 2 in 1962.

The representation of the fans (theater), 1962.

The internal war (essay), 1963.

Power of the novel (essay), 1965.

Resentment (novels), 1966.

The Ice Bar (novel), 1967.

The network (narrations and stories), 1968.

The penultimate door (novel), 1969.

Gabriel Andaral (novel), 1971.

Sad skin of the universe (novel), 1971.

References

1. The nation. "On Sunday Eduardo Mallea will be remembered." Argentina, 2003.
2. Lago-Carballo, Antonio. "Eduardo Mallea: an Argentine passion". Aleph Magazine, Colombia, 2007.
3. Gerse Maria. "Narrative levels in all greenery will perish by Eduardo Mallea". 2002.
4. Rodríguez Monegal, Emir. "Narrators of this America." 1992.
5. Luis Borges, Jorge. "Recovered Texts (1956-1986)". Spain, 2011.
6. Baquero, Gastón. "Literary notes of Spain and America". 2014.