José Belmonte Serrano y José Manuel López de Abiada (eds.). “Alatriste: la sombra del héroe”. Madrid: Alfaguara, 2009, 519 pp.

Abstract

This text comments on the monograph on the character Captain Alatriste, created by Arturo Pérez-Reverte. The articles that make up the volume are distributed by theme: aesthetics and applications of the saga. The introduction describes the essential characteristics of the protagonist and the writer's objectives, which, among others, is to show that the situation has not changed much in Spain since the Golden Age regarding social issues. Each collaborator of the volume focuses on a different installment of the series to break down its relevant points, such as intertextuality, the recreation of past times, the languages spoken, the subjectivity of history according to the narrator, the way in which fiction and story, the relationship between the narrative and the illustrations that accompany it. The volume concludes with an interview with the author himself, which gives an account of his creative process and his analysis of history and society.