Married to the retired magistrate of Vetusta, Ana Ozores cares deeply for her much older husband but feels stifled by the monotony of her life in the shabby and conservative provincial town. And when she embarks on a quest for fulfillment through religion and even adultery, a bitter struggle begins between a powerful priest and a would-be Don Juan for the passionate young woman's body and soul. Scandalizing contemporary Spain when it was first published in 1885, with its searing critique of the Church and its frank treatment of sex, La Regenta is a compelling and witty depiction of the complacent and frivolous world of upper-class society.

Novelist-critic Leopoldo Alas's reputation suffered neglect and silent reproval during much of the twentieth century, especially under the Franco regime, but his reputation has now achieved classic status in Spain. Clearly related to this is the great increase in the number of translations - Julian Barnes called La Regenta 'the foreign classic tardily discovered'. This bibliography picks up where the first one left off in 1984. It is divided into primary material and secondary material. Primary material includes: Anthologies and Selections; Criticism; Novels; Short Story Collections; Plays; Correspondence; Prologues; Reprints; Translations; and Miscellaneous, with two new categories: autograph manuscripts and iconography.

"The short stories explore themes that concern the interior person, the inner being. "A Day Laborer" tells of a liberal intellectual who can identify with exploited laborers because he himself has been exploited; "Change of Light" describes the spiritual peace that comes to a writer as a result of physical blindness; "The Golden Rose" shows through a series of contrasts - good and evil, heaven and earth, light and darkness - that virtue and sacrifice are rewarded; "Queen Margaret" chronicles the misery of failed opera singers who find happiness after leaving the short-lived glory of the theater; "Torso" relates the faithfulness of a servant who is rejected by a young master; "The Burial of the Sardine," with echoes of Francisco de Goya, represents the ephemeral nature of joy as experienced during Shrovetide in a city dominated by the clergy; and "Two Scholars" recounts how envy and vanity affect a personal relationship."--BOOK JACKET.

Los Cuentos morales, constituyen una colecci�n de veintiocho relatos de muy diverso tono: puramente sat�ricos (�Gonz�lez Brib�n�, �Snob�), on�ricos (�El fr�o del papa�) o simb�licos (�La noche-mala del diablo�). Destacan especialmente aquellos en los que predomina la ternura y el lirismo: �Boro�a�, �Chiripa�, �El d�o de la tos�, �Un grabado�, �El torso�, �El Quin�, �La trampa�, �El sustituto�, �La reina margarita�. En ocasiones, s�tira y ternura se dan la mano, como en �Flirtation leg�tima�. No hallamos en ning�n caso juicios de valor: compete al lector inteligente extraer los principios morales que se esconden tras las peripecias de estos personajes y sus vicisitudes.

De lo que aconteci.

Now, for the first time, the stories of Spanish writer Leopoldo Alas have been translated into English. This is an important collection from a writer who is remembered as a master story-teller.