241

La ciudad junto al río inmóvil, p. 157.

242

Papini also declares that women have not really affected the development of his soul (op. cit., pp. 136-137). Mallea, however, in spite of his characters' actions, speaks of the importance of women in the lives of all great men. La bahía de silencio, pp. 189-190.

243

For instance, Unamuno's Vida de Don Quijote y Sancho, with its emphasis on the creative power of subjectivity.

244

The national problem is perhaps more dominant in Barrès' thought than in Mallea's, and certainly more specific, owing to the focal point of the Franco Prussian War.

245

See «El alejamiento de Franz Kafka», in El sayal y la púrpura.

246

Historia de una pasión argentina, p. 46.

247

Information on Sartre's views is derived chiefly from his pamphlet L'Existentialisme est un humanisme.

248

Sartre (ibid., p. 12) complicates the idea of man's responsibility by asserting, on the one hand, that each man's choices are of universal import and, on the other hand, that he recognizes that «toute vérité et toute action impliquent un milieu et une subjectivité humaine».

249

In Historia de una pasión argentina, pp. 49-50, Mallea writes of his predominant interest in existence rather than essence. It is, however, apparent from the passage that by «esencia» he means an abstract component of a philosophical system; he can at the same time affirm that a blade of grass bears drama «en la entraña de su ser perecedero, ... en su destino vegetal». The implication is that this type of essence is not preceded by existence.

250

Notas de un novelista, pp. 18-19.