Hugo Wast Biography

Hugo Wast

(Córdoba, 1883-Buenos Aires, 1962) Pseudonym of the Argentine novelist Gustavo Martínez Zuviría, one of the most discussed Argentine writers of the 20th century.Of some of his novels, such as Flor de durazno (1911), taken to the big screen in what was Carlos Gardel's acting debut, more than one hundred thousand copies were sold, and many of them translations have been made in up to eight languages; however, the criticism is generally negative: some historians of Spanish-American literature go so far as to dispense with his name; others even affirm that their work lacks literary value.

Hugo Wast, one of the most widely read Spanish-speaking writers in the world, became a lawyer at the Universidad del Litoral (Santa Fe), was a professor of Economics at said University and directed the National Library, in Buenos Aires, from 1931 to 1955.Deputy to the Cortes (1916-1920) and Minister of Justice and Public Education (1943-1944), he obtained in 1922 the gold medal of the Royal Spanish Academy of the Language for his novel Valle Negro (1918), which was praised by Miguel de Unamuno, and the National Prize for Literature in 1926 for his Stone Desert (1925), perhaps his most valuable work for its costumbrista value and its sense of the landscape.

After those already mentioned, his most interesting novel is La casa de los cuervos , published in 1916.Taking as references the Spanish novelists Vicente Blasco Ibáñez and Armando Palacio Valdés, It has been called the "Catholic Blasco Ibáñez" and the "Argentine Valdés Palace"; the first claim has much less foundation than the second.Hugo Wast is a realistic storyteller who feels horror at what he judges excesses of naturalism; but his costumbrista realism is not regulated by an aesthetic concern, but by a moral obsession; the author puts his literature at the service of Catholic morality, without trying to delve deeper, and his novels turn out to be superficial and tendentious, without adequate psychological insight.

But he cannot be denied ease and even elegance to his style, as the novelist cannot be bargained for observation skills, descriptive faculties and an extraordinary sense of the tastes and inclinations of the general public.He put more than thirty books to the press; apart from those already mentioned, they deserve special mention Alegre (1905); Little Great Souls (1907), reissued in 1917 with a new title: Girlfriend on vacation ; Sealed fountain (1914); Turbulent city, happy city (1919); The celestial tie (1920); The conquered love (1921); The avenger (1922); The ears of Ruth (1926); Myriam the conspirator (1926); The Fire Horseman (1926); Land of Jaguars (1927); and Lucía Miranda (1929).The biography of Saint John Bosco entitled Don Bosco and his time (1932) was followed by El Kahal (1935), Oro (1935), Juana Tabor (1942), 666 (1942), Waiting against all hope (1944) and Adventures of Father Vespignani (1948).

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