At the dawn of the rural novel: El sabor de la tierruca by José María de Pereda

This book offers a critical study of José María de Pereda's El sabor de la tierruca (1882), regarded as a foundational work in the development of the nineteenth-century Spanish rural novel. Its main purpose is to examine the narrative, descriptive, and ideological techniques through which Pereda constructs a literary universe where landscape, traditional customs, and rural communities assume greater significance than the plot itself. The study explores characterisation, particularly the relationship between conventional figures inherited from costumbrismo and fully developed fictional characters, together with the representation of social hierarchies and traditional values. Special attention is devoted to landscape, understood not merely as a setting but as a structural and symbolic element expressing regional identity and the author's ideological perspective.

The book also investigates folklore, popular traditions, and representations of everyday rural life, alongside the compositional strategies that combine costumbrista scenes with fictional narrative. It examines the role of the omniscient narrator, the reproduction of popular speech, and the importance of linguistic variation in shaping the fictional world. A particularly significant contribution is the analysis of Apeles Mestres's illustrations for the novel's first edition, resulting from an unusual collaboration between writer and illustrator that reinforces the narrative's visual dimension. Finally, the study places Pereda's fiction within the broader European literary context, identifies connections with other practitioners of rural fiction, and reassesses his contribution to the development of the genre. The book consequently proposes a renewed understanding of Pereda as a precursor of a narrative tradition in which rural society becomes a subject of aesthetic representation, reflection on collective identity, and ideological debate, highlighting the enduring literary significance of his distinctive fictional approach.