Alvaro Retana (1890-1970), who many consider The Spanish Petronius,
belongs to that lighthearted erotic literature trend popular during
the early twentieth Century, that became known in Spain as
Sicalipsis (from ancient Greek sykon -fig, or vulva- and aleiptikos
-to stimulate). In open opposition to the somber and solemn Spanish
'98 generation, and other representatives of the so called high
culture, Retana's popular erotic novelettes showcased the smiling
and playful face of a country that during the 1920s and 1930s
openly embraced European modernity and stood up to its challenges,
among them the sexual revolution and explicit eroticism. Alvaro
Retana, a flamboyant and openly homosexual artist, illustrator,
fashion designer, and renowned composer of cuples (a cuple is a
risque popular song usually sung in variety shows), is also the
successful author of many sicaliptic novelettes, among them, the
four short novels included in this volume. Retana is one of the
first writers who, in Las locas de postin and other openly queer
and sexually explicit novels, dare to depict the uninhibited
sensuality of a free and happy-go-lucky Spain, soon to die at the
hands of the Franco dictatorship. Retana's smiling and festive
homoeroticism, clearly a forerunner of Almodovar's and Mendicutti's
gay aesthetics, stands in stark contrast to the apocalyptic and
pessimistic vision of homosexuality in Alfonso Hernandez-Cata's
novel El Angel de Sodoma (Stockcero 2011), a novel, like Retana's
fictions, meant to depict the gay underground world of early
twentieth century Spain. Retana openly celebrates queer love, as
well as the sexuality of women, both homosexual and straight.
Novelettes such as Los ambiguos, Lolita buscadora de emociones, and
El tonto amply instruct the unabashed tobillera, or Spanish
flapper, in the pleasures of Venus. This volume comprises four of
Retana's most successful novels, and with the critical foreword and
footnotes by Maite Zubiaurre and Audrey Harris gives a clearer view
of what the Spanish society was really reading while the high
literature obtained all the academic applause.
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