María Teresa León
Encyclopedia
María Teresa León was a Spanish writer, activist and cultural ambassador. Born in Logroño
, she was the niece of the Spanish feminist and writer María Goyri (the wife of Ramón Menéndez Pidal
). She herself was married to the Spanish poet Rafael Alberti
. She contributed numerous articles to the periodical Diario de Burgos and published the children's books Cuentos para soñar and La bella del mal amor.
army, María Teresa grew up in a wealthy household filled with books and that was constantly on the move. As a girl she lived in Madrid
, Barcelona
and Burgos
reading the books of Victor Hugo
, Alexandre Dumas and Benito Pérez Galdós
. Due to the itinerant nature of her father's career, nomadism had a profound impact on her life. Her mother, Oliva Goyri, an unconventional woman for her day, sent her to study at the Institución Libre de Enseñanza (Free Institution of Education), where her aunt, María Goyri, taught. She earned a BA in Philosophy
and Letters.
In 1920, when she was sixteen, she married Gonzalo de Sebastián Alfaro and had two sons, Gonzalo (b.1921) and Enrique (b.1925). The marriage didn't last, she lost custody of her two children and moved to her family home in Burgos
. There she began to contribute articles for the Diario de Burgos that dealt with current affairs, culture, and women's rights. She wrote under the pseudonym
Isabel Inghirami, the heroine of Gabriele d'Annunzio
's Forse si che, Forse che no (Maybe yes, Maybe no). She made her first visit to Argentina
in 1928. In 1929 she met the poet Rafael Alberti
who was to become her lifetime companion. They were married in a civil ceremony in Mallorca
in 1932. That year the Patronato del Centro para Ampliación de Estudios (Board for Advanced Studies) gave her a grant to study the European theatre movement. She travelled to Berlin
, Belgium
, Denmark
, the Netherlands
, Norway
and the Soviet Union
meeting the so-called "Revolutionary writers" and writing a dozen articles that were published in El Heraldo de Madrid.
In 1933 María and Alberti
founded the journal Octubre and in 1934 she returned to the Soviet Union
to attend the "First Congress of Soviet Writers" where she met Maxim Gorki, André Malraux
and Erwin Piscator
among others. Later that year she went to the United States
to raise funds for the workers affected by the October 1934 Asturian miners' revolt
which soon developed into an armed insurrection against the Spanish government
ending in the deaths of 2,000 people including priests, miners and army personnel. This response eventually led to the coalition
of different leftist factions that sparked the creation of the Popular Front
.
when the Spanish Civil War
broke out. They returned to Madrid
where she became secretary of the Alliance of Antifascist Writers and founded the magazine, El mono azul (The Blue Overall) which came out on August 27, 1936. Contributors included Manuel Altolaguirre
, Antonio Aparicio
, Vicente Aleixandre
, José Bergamin
, Luis Cernuda
, Antonio Machado
, Ramón J. Sender, Lorenzo Varela
, María Zambrano
and many non-Spanish writers such as John Dos Passos
, Vicente Huidobro
, André Malraux
and Pablo Neruda
. The publication lasted for forty-seven issues, almost the entire period of the civil war.
She served on the Junta de Defensa y Protección del Tesoro Artístico Nacional (Board of Defense and Protection of National Artistic Patrimony) which saved the art of the Museo del Prado
, Palacio Real, Palacio Liria
and the El Escorial
from the aerial bombardment during the war. At first the art was stored in the Prado
, but after the Prado was directly hit by nine bombs in late November, María, along with her husband Rafael
led the December 3rd evacuation of the Prado with a convoy of camouflaged trucks to a safe location in Valencia. Rafael later wrote Noche de guerra en el Museo del Prado (Night of War in the Prado Museum), a play in which characters in paintings by Goya come to life to defend the besieged city of Madrid. The play premiered at the Piccolo Theatre in Rome
in 1973 and at the Teatro María Guerrero
, Madrid in 1977.
defeat they fled to Paris
via Oran
. They lived in Paris until the end of 1940 working as translators for French
radio and as announcers for the broadcasts of Paris-Mondial in Latin-America. After the German occupation of France they sailed from Marseilles to Buenos Aires
on the SS Mendoza
where they were reunited with thousands of other Spaniards who had been forced to flee their country. Here she used exile to her advantage to criticize her country and avoid the Francoist censorship. In 1941 María gave birth to their daughter, the poet Aitana. During the 1940s and 1950s she gave readings of her work at benefits that aided Nazi victims or striking workers in Argentina; many of which were in organized in collaboration with soprano Isa Kremer
who sang at these benefits. With the arrival of Juan Perón
the political and artistic censorship imposed made life increasingly difficult in Argentina
and in 1963, after a 23-year stay in Buenos Aires
, they moved to Rome
. On April 27, 1977 they returned to Spain
after almost thirty-eight years of exile. María, however, was suffering from Alzheimer's and could not recognize even her closest old friends. She spent her last years in a sanatorium in the mountains outside Madrid
. She died on December 13, 1988 and is buried in the cemetery at Majadahonda
just outside Madrid. On her grave are the words written by her husband: "Esta mañana, amor, tenemos veinte años" (This morning, love, we have twenty years). María Teresa León always carried her love for Gonzalo and Enrique, her first children. In her life she suffered from the separations produced by two exiles: the first from her children, and then from her country.
Novels:
Non-Fiction:
Plays:
Screenplays:
Logroño
Logroño is a city in northern Spain, on the Ebro River. It is the capital of the autonomous community of La Rioja, formerly known as La Rioja Province.The population of Logroño in 2008 was 153,736 and a metropolitan population of nearly 197,000 inhabitants...
, she was the niece of the Spanish feminist and writer María Goyri (the wife of Ramón Menéndez Pidal
Ramón Menéndez Pidal
Ramón Menéndez Pidal was a Spanish philologist and historian. He worked extensively on the history of the Spanish language and Spanish folklore and folk poetry. One of his main topics was the history and legend of The Cid....
). She herself was married to the Spanish poet Rafael Alberti
Rafael Alberti
Rafael Alberti Merello was a Spanish poet, a member of the Generation of '27....
. She contributed numerous articles to the periodical Diario de Burgos and published the children's books Cuentos para soñar and La bella del mal amor.
Life
Daughter of Angel León, a colonel in the SpanishSpain
Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...
army, María Teresa grew up in a wealthy household filled with books and that was constantly on the move. As a girl she lived in Madrid
Madrid
Madrid is the capital and largest city of Spain. The population of the city is roughly 3.3 million and the entire population of the Madrid metropolitan area is calculated to be 6.271 million. It is the third largest city in the European Union, after London and Berlin, and its metropolitan...
, Barcelona
Barcelona
Barcelona is the second largest city in Spain after Madrid, and the capital of Catalonia, with a population of 1,621,537 within its administrative limits on a land area of...
and Burgos
Burgos
Burgos is a city of northern Spain, historic capital of Castile. It is situated at the edge of the central plateau, with about 178,966 inhabitants in the city proper and another 20,000 in its suburbs. It is the capital of the province of Burgos, in the autonomous community of Castile and León...
reading the books of Victor Hugo
Victor Hugo
Victor-Marie Hugo was a Frenchpoet, playwright, novelist, essayist, visual artist, statesman, human rights activist and exponent of the Romantic movement in France....
, Alexandre Dumas and Benito Pérez Galdós
Benito Pérez Galdós
Benito Pérez Galdós was a Spanish realist novelist. Considered second only to Cervantes in stature, he was the leading Spanish realist novelist....
. Due to the itinerant nature of her father's career, nomadism had a profound impact on her life. Her mother, Oliva Goyri, an unconventional woman for her day, sent her to study at the Institución Libre de Enseñanza (Free Institution of Education), where her aunt, María Goyri, taught. She earned a BA in Philosophy
Philosophy
Philosophy is the study of general and fundamental problems, such as those connected with existence, knowledge, values, reason, mind, and language. Philosophy is distinguished from other ways of addressing such problems by its critical, generally systematic approach and its reliance on rational...
and Letters.
In 1920, when she was sixteen, she married Gonzalo de Sebastián Alfaro and had two sons, Gonzalo (b.1921) and Enrique (b.1925). The marriage didn't last, she lost custody of her two children and moved to her family home in Burgos
Burgos
Burgos is a city of northern Spain, historic capital of Castile. It is situated at the edge of the central plateau, with about 178,966 inhabitants in the city proper and another 20,000 in its suburbs. It is the capital of the province of Burgos, in the autonomous community of Castile and León...
. There she began to contribute articles for the Diario de Burgos that dealt with current affairs, culture, and women's rights. She wrote under the pseudonym
Pseudonym
A pseudonym is a name that a person assumes for a particular purpose and that differs from his or her original orthonym...
Isabel Inghirami, the heroine of Gabriele d'Annunzio
Gabriele D'Annunzio
Gabriele D'Annunzio or d'Annunzio was an Italian poet, journalist, novelist, and dramatist...
's Forse si che, Forse che no (Maybe yes, Maybe no). She made her first visit to Argentina
Argentina
Argentina , officially the Argentine Republic , is the second largest country in South America by land area, after Brazil. It is constituted as a federation of 23 provinces and an autonomous city, Buenos Aires...
in 1928. In 1929 she met the poet Rafael Alberti
Rafael Alberti
Rafael Alberti Merello was a Spanish poet, a member of the Generation of '27....
who was to become her lifetime companion. They were married in a civil ceremony in Mallorca
Mallorca
Majorca or Mallorca is an island located in the Mediterranean Sea, one of the Balearic Islands.The capital of the island, Palma, is also the capital of the autonomous community of the Balearic Islands. The Cabrera Archipelago is administratively grouped with Majorca...
in 1932. That year the Patronato del Centro para Ampliación de Estudios (Board for Advanced Studies) gave her a grant to study the European theatre movement. She travelled to Berlin
Berlin
Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...
, Belgium
Belgium
Belgium , officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a federal state in Western Europe. It is a founding member of the European Union and hosts the EU's headquarters, and those of several other major international organisations such as NATO.Belgium is also a member of, or affiliated to, many...
, Denmark
Denmark
Denmark is a Scandinavian country in Northern Europe. The countries of Denmark and Greenland, as well as the Faroe Islands, constitute the Kingdom of Denmark . It is the southernmost of the Nordic countries, southwest of Sweden and south of Norway, and bordered to the south by Germany. Denmark...
, the Netherlands
Netherlands
The Netherlands is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, located mainly in North-West Europe and with several islands in the Caribbean. Mainland Netherlands borders the North Sea to the north and west, Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east, and shares maritime borders...
, Norway
Norway
Norway , officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic unitary constitutional monarchy whose territory comprises the western portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula, Jan Mayen, and the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard and Bouvet Island. Norway has a total area of and a population of about 4.9 million...
and the Soviet Union
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
meeting the so-called "Revolutionary writers" and writing a dozen articles that were published in El Heraldo de Madrid.
In 1933 María and Alberti
Rafael Alberti
Rafael Alberti Merello was a Spanish poet, a member of the Generation of '27....
founded the journal Octubre and in 1934 she returned to the Soviet Union
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
to attend the "First Congress of Soviet Writers" where she met Maxim Gorki, André Malraux
André Malraux
André Malraux DSO was a French adventurer, award-winning author, and statesman. Having traveled extensively in Indochina and China, Malraux was noted especially for his novel entitled La Condition Humaine , which won the Prix Goncourt...
and Erwin Piscator
Erwin Piscator
Erwin Friedrich Maximilian Piscator was a German theatre director and producer and, with Bertolt Brecht, the foremost exponent of epic theatre, a form that emphasizes the socio-political content of drama, rather than its emotional manipulation of the audience or on the production's formal...
among others. Later that year she went to the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
to raise funds for the workers affected by the October 1934 Asturian miners' revolt
Asturian miners' strike of 1934
The Asturian miners' strike of 1934 was a major strike action which took place in Asturias in northern Spain soon developing into armed insurrection against the Spanish government.-Background:...
which soon developed into an armed insurrection against the Spanish government
Second Spanish Republic
The Second Spanish Republic was the government of Spain between April 14 1931, and its destruction by a military rebellion, led by General Francisco Franco....
ending in the deaths of 2,000 people including priests, miners and army personnel. This response eventually led to the coalition
Coalition
A coalition is a pact or treaty among individuals or groups, during which they cooperate in joint action, each in their own self-interest, joining forces together for a common cause. This alliance may be temporary or a matter of convenience. A coalition thus differs from a more formal covenant...
of different leftist factions that sparked the creation of the Popular Front
Popular Front (Spain)
The Popular Front in Spain's Second Republic was an electoral coalition and pact signed in January 1936 by various left-wing political organisations, instigated by Manuel Azaña for the purpose of contesting that year's election....
.
Spanish Civil War
On July 18, 1936 María and Rafael were in IbizaIbiza
Ibiza or Eivissa is a Spanish island in the Mediterranean Sea 79 km off the coast of the city of Valencia in Spain. It is the third largest of the Balearic Islands, an autonomous community of Spain. With Formentera, it is one of the two Pine Islands or Pityuses. Its largest cities are Ibiza...
when the Spanish Civil War
Spanish Civil War
The Spanish Civil WarAlso known as The Crusade among Nationalists, the Fourth Carlist War among Carlists, and The Rebellion or Uprising among Republicans. was a major conflict fought in Spain from 17 July 1936 to 1 April 1939...
broke out. They returned to Madrid
Madrid
Madrid is the capital and largest city of Spain. The population of the city is roughly 3.3 million and the entire population of the Madrid metropolitan area is calculated to be 6.271 million. It is the third largest city in the European Union, after London and Berlin, and its metropolitan...
where she became secretary of the Alliance of Antifascist Writers and founded the magazine, El mono azul (The Blue Overall) which came out on August 27, 1936. Contributors included Manuel Altolaguirre
Manuel Altolaguirre
Manuel Altolaguirre was a Spanish poet, an editor, publisher, and printer of poetry, and a member of the Generation of '27.-Biography:...
, Antonio Aparicio
António Aparício
António Aires dos Santos Aparício is a former Portuguese footballer, who played as a striker.-External links:**...
, Vicente Aleixandre
Vicente Aleixandre
Vicente Pío Marcelino Cirilo Aleixandre y Merlo was a Spanish poet who was born in Seville. Aleixandre was a Nobel Prize laureate for Literature in 1977. He was part of the Generation of '27. He died in Madrid in 1984....
, José Bergamin
José Bergamín
José Bergamín Gutiérrez was a Spanish writer, essayist, poet, and playwright. His father served as president of the canton of Málaga; his mother was a devout Catholic...
, Luis Cernuda
Luis Cernuda
Luis Cernuda , was a Spanish poet and literary critic.-Life and career:...
, Antonio Machado
Antonio Machado
Antonio Cipriano José María y Francisco de Santa Ana Machado y Ruiz, known as Antonio Machado was a Spanish poet and one of the leading figures of the Spanish literary movement known as the Generation of '98....
, Ramón J. Sender, Lorenzo Varela
Lorenzo Varela
Xesús Lorenzo Varela Vázquez was a Galician poet.-Life:Varela was born in a boat, while his parents, emigrants from Galicia, were going to Havana, Cuba. Some people consider it to be a kind of prophecy, as Varela lived in exile for most of his life.Varela returned to Galicia and grew up in Lugo...
, María Zambrano
María Zambrano
María Zambrano Alarcón was a Spanish essayist and philosopher.Zambrano studied under and was influenced by José Ortega y Gasset and went on to teach Metaphysics at Madrid University from 1931 to 1936...
and many non-Spanish writers such as John Dos Passos
John Dos Passos
John Roderigo Dos Passos was an American novelist and artist.-Early life:Born in Chicago, Illinois, Dos Passos was the illegitimate son of John Randolph Dos Passos , a distinguished lawyer of Madeiran Portuguese descent, and Lucy Addison Sprigg Madison of Petersburg, Virginia. The elder Dos Passos...
, Vicente Huidobro
Vicente Huidobro
Vicente García-Huidobro Fernández was a Chilean poet born to an aristocratic family. He was an exponent of the artistic movement called Creacionismo , which held that a poet should bring life to the things he or she writes about, rather than just describe them.Huidobro was born into a wealthy...
, André Malraux
André Malraux
André Malraux DSO was a French adventurer, award-winning author, and statesman. Having traveled extensively in Indochina and China, Malraux was noted especially for his novel entitled La Condition Humaine , which won the Prix Goncourt...
and Pablo Neruda
Pablo Neruda
Pablo Neruda was the pen name and, later, legal name of the Chilean poet, diplomat and politician Neftalí Ricardo Reyes Basoalto. He chose his pen name after Czech poet Jan Neruda....
. The publication lasted for forty-seven issues, almost the entire period of the civil war.
She served on the Junta de Defensa y Protección del Tesoro Artístico Nacional (Board of Defense and Protection of National Artistic Patrimony) which saved the art of the Museo del Prado
Museo del Prado
The Museo del Prado is the main Spanish national art museum, located in central Madrid. It features one of the world's finest collections of European art, from the 12th century to the early 19th century, based on the former Spanish Royal Collection, and unquestionably the best single collection of...
, Palacio Real, Palacio Liria
Liria Palace
The Liria Palace or Palacio de Liria is a Neoclassical palace in Madrid, Spain. Built around 1770 by the Duke of Berwick on designs of Ventura Rodríguez, in the early 19th century it passed to the inheritance of the House of Alba. All but the facades were destroyed during the Spanish Civil War...
and the El Escorial
El Escorial
The Royal Seat of San Lorenzo de El Escorial is a historical residence of the king of Spain, in the town of San Lorenzo de El Escorial, about 45 kilometres northwest of the capital, Madrid, in Spain. It is one of the Spanish royal sites and functions as a monastery, royal palace, museum, and...
from the aerial bombardment during the war. At first the art was stored in the Prado
Museo del Prado
The Museo del Prado is the main Spanish national art museum, located in central Madrid. It features one of the world's finest collections of European art, from the 12th century to the early 19th century, based on the former Spanish Royal Collection, and unquestionably the best single collection of...
, but after the Prado was directly hit by nine bombs in late November, María, along with her husband Rafael
Rafael Alberti
Rafael Alberti Merello was a Spanish poet, a member of the Generation of '27....
led the December 3rd evacuation of the Prado with a convoy of camouflaged trucks to a safe location in Valencia. Rafael later wrote Noche de guerra en el Museo del Prado (Night of War in the Prado Museum), a play in which characters in paintings by Goya come to life to defend the besieged city of Madrid. The play premiered at the Piccolo Theatre in Rome
Rome
Rome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated city and comune, with over 2.7 million residents in . The city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, on the Tiber River within the Lazio region of Italy.Rome's history spans two and a half...
in 1973 and at the Teatro María Guerrero
María Guerrero
María Guerrero Torija was a prominent Spanish theatre actor, producer and director.-Life and work:María Guerrero Torija was born in Madrid, in 1867. She enrolled at the Official School of Declamation, in the prestigious Madrid Royal Conservatory, where she was trained in the theatre with dramatist...
, Madrid in 1977.
Exile (1939-1977)
After the RepublicanSecond Spanish Republic
The Second Spanish Republic was the government of Spain between April 14 1931, and its destruction by a military rebellion, led by General Francisco Franco....
defeat they fled to Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
via Oran
Oran
Oran is a major city on the northwestern Mediterranean coast of Algeria, and the second largest city of the country.It is the capital of the Oran Province . The city has a population of 759,645 , while the metropolitan area has a population of approximately 1,500,000, making it the second largest...
. They lived in Paris until the end of 1940 working as translators for French
French language
French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...
radio and as announcers for the broadcasts of Paris-Mondial in Latin-America. After the German occupation of France they sailed from Marseilles to Buenos Aires
Buenos Aires
Buenos Aires is the capital and largest city of Argentina, and the second-largest metropolitan area in South America, after São Paulo. It is located on the western shore of the estuary of the Río de la Plata, on the southeastern coast of the South American continent...
on the SS Mendoza
SS Caserta
SS Caserta was an Italian ocean liner named for the city of Caserta in the Campania region of Italy. She was previously known as SS Maritzburg and SS Mendoza, and was later renamed SS Venezuela. Launched in 1904 as Maritzburg for the Bucknall Line, the ship was sold to Lloyd Italiano in 1905 and...
where they were reunited with thousands of other Spaniards who had been forced to flee their country. Here she used exile to her advantage to criticize her country and avoid the Francoist censorship. In 1941 María gave birth to their daughter, the poet Aitana. During the 1940s and 1950s she gave readings of her work at benefits that aided Nazi victims or striking workers in Argentina; many of which were in organized in collaboration with soprano Isa Kremer
Isa Kremer
Isa Kremer: The People's Diva, is a documentary produced in 2000 and directed by Nina Baker Feinberg and Ted Schillinger. It focuses on Isa Kremer, an international singing sensation.-Summary:...
who sang at these benefits. With the arrival of Juan Perón
Juan Perón
Juan Domingo Perón was an Argentine military officer, and politician. Perón was three times elected as President of Argentina though he only managed to serve one full term, after serving in several government positions, including the Secretary of Labor and the Vice Presidency...
the political and artistic censorship imposed made life increasingly difficult in Argentina
Argentina
Argentina , officially the Argentine Republic , is the second largest country in South America by land area, after Brazil. It is constituted as a federation of 23 provinces and an autonomous city, Buenos Aires...
and in 1963, after a 23-year stay in Buenos Aires
Buenos Aires
Buenos Aires is the capital and largest city of Argentina, and the second-largest metropolitan area in South America, after São Paulo. It is located on the western shore of the estuary of the Río de la Plata, on the southeastern coast of the South American continent...
, they moved to Rome
Rome
Rome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated city and comune, with over 2.7 million residents in . The city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, on the Tiber River within the Lazio region of Italy.Rome's history spans two and a half...
. On April 27, 1977 they returned to Spain
Spain
Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...
after almost thirty-eight years of exile. María, however, was suffering from Alzheimer's and could not recognize even her closest old friends. She spent her last years in a sanatorium in the mountains outside Madrid
Madrid
Madrid is the capital and largest city of Spain. The population of the city is roughly 3.3 million and the entire population of the Madrid metropolitan area is calculated to be 6.271 million. It is the third largest city in the European Union, after London and Berlin, and its metropolitan...
. She died on December 13, 1988 and is buried in the cemetery at Majadahonda
Majadahonda
Majadahonda is a municipality in Spain, situated 16 km northwest of Madrid, in the Community of Madrid. In 2009 the population was 66,585 inhabitants .It lies alongside the motorway A6 Madrid-A Coruña....
just outside Madrid. On her grave are the words written by her husband: "Esta mañana, amor, tenemos veinte años" (This morning, love, we have twenty years). María Teresa León always carried her love for Gonzalo and Enrique, her first children. In her life she suffered from the separations produced by two exiles: the first from her children, and then from her country.
Writings
Collections of Short Stories:- Cuentos para soñar (Tales for Dreaming), (1928, dedicated to her eldest son, Gonzalo)
- Le bella del mal amor (The Beauty of Bad Love), (1930)
- Rosa-Fría, patinadora de la luna (Rosa-Fría, Moon Skater), (1934)
- Tales from Contemporary Spain, (1935)
- Morirás lejos (You Will Die Far Away), (1942)
- Fábulas del tiempo amargo (Fables of Bitter Times), (1962)
Novels:
- Contra viento y marea (Against All Odds), (1941)
- El gran amor de Gustavo Adolfo Bécquer (Gustavo Adolfo Bécquer's Great Love), (1946)
- Don Rodrigo Díaz de Vivar, el Cid Campeador, (1954)
- Juego limpio (Clean Game), (1954)
- Menesteos, marinero de abril (Menesteos, Seaman of April), (1965)
- Doña Jimena Díaz de Vivar, (1968)
- Cervantes, El soldado que nos enseñó a hablar (Cervantes, the Soldier Who Taught Us to Speak), (1978)
Non-Fiction:
- La historia tiene la palabra (History Has the Word), (1944)
- Sonríe China (China Smiles), (1958)
- Memoria de la Melancolía (Memory of Melancholy), (1977) - Autobiography
Plays:
- Huelga en el Puerto (Strike at the Harbor), (1933)
- La liberdad en el tejado (Freedom on the Roof), (written in exile and published in 1989)
Screenplays:
- Los ojos más bellos del mundo (The Most Beautiful Eyes in the World), (1943)
- La dama duende (The Phantom Lady), (1945)
- Nuestro hogar de cada día (Our Daily Home), (1958, for radio)