Written in the late 1930s, soon after the fall of military dictator Primo de Rivera, San Manuel Bueno, Martyr was published in a time of economic crisis and political instability. King Alfonso XIII remained on the throne but shared Rivera's popular antipathy, meanwhile the mostly anticlerical republicans were rapidly gaining support ahead of the municipal elections. In his 'nivola', Unamuno explores the idea of ​​Truth. I will take this to mean that which is in accordance with facts or reality and does not necessarily contain transcendental meaning, although this may be the case. Unamuno uses both form and content to portray the elusive nature of Truth and the importance of perception and belief when dwelling on the question of Truth, something that was especially relevant given the historical context. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essay The truth and its search: the theme that The notion of truth, especially when related to the eternal search for religious truth and the question of faith, is clearly prominent in the content of the novel. Don Manuel commits himself to a life of deliberate falsehood because he believes that there are some truths too horrible to be told, 'la verdad... es acaso something terrible, something intolerable; sencilla people cannot live with her [1]. Manuel believes that knowledge of the miserable Truth about existence is too heavy a burden for the common man. He believes that life can be led in blissful ignorance of humanity's mortal and temporal nature through belief in a God and an afterlife, or in the knowledge that we are ultimately doomed to die. This, in turn, raises the question of the value of religion and blind faith in the modern world. San Manuel Bueno, martir is in fact a novel completely against the progressive cause; Lzaro's spiritual death is associated with his exposure to progressivism in the New World. There is a particularly uncomfortable phrase when Manuel echoes Karl Marx, 'Opio… Opio… Opio, s. Dmosle opio, y che duerma y que suee'[2]; the comparison of religion with opium and the emphatic repetition of the word in the dialogue give the sensation of being lulled into a dreamlike state. It seems that Unamuno is propagating the benefits of religion and, in particular, by presenting Manuel as the hero of the novel, he seems to advocate happiness based on blind faith and tradition. In this way, probably the Truth in terms of discovering the meaning of life is actually irrelevant because having faith in the Truth is simply a means to an end; a way in which the common man is able to live his life contentedly and without fear. Unamuno himself is known to have suffered from recurrent thanatophobia arising in part from his religious crisis in 1897; he said that "my religion is to seek truth in life and life in truth, knowing that I shall not find them while I live"[3] and believed that much of all human activity was an attempt to survive, in some form after our death. He wrote in his diary that he had two choices, become Catholic or live a life of depression[4]. San Manuel Bueno, martyr actually goes further and suggests very much that the truth about the function of religion actually goes further. back in history. Simply by the name 'Manuel', which in Hebrew is 'Immanuel', Manuel's patron is Christ himself: 'his patron saint was el mismo Jesus Nuestro Seor'[5]. Furthermore, the spiritual 'resurrection' of Lazarus in chapter 13 can be directly compared to the story of Christ and Lazarus in St. John 11:1-45. In fact, throughout the novel there is allusion to the fact that Manuel should bea representation of Jesus Christ himself; he is able to heal the sick, has carpentry skills, and his 'divine voice' moves the congregation in a transcendent way, making the village tremble as he shouts: "Dios mo!" My God! So he abandoned me[6]. Manuel also reports to Lazaro that more than one of the greatest saints had died without belief in an afterlife. Thus Unamuno plants in the reader's mind the idea that some of the Church's leading figures died without believing in the immortality of the soul. When thinking about the notion of Truth in San Manuel Bueno, martir, the consideration of form is crucial and easily overlooked. In terms of narrative structure, the entire story is a second-hand account of Don Manuel's life. This basic shift is further complicated because Manuel never confides in Angela, and she learns vital information about his disbelief from his brother Lazaro. In this way the story is refracted into two phases and is often a third-hand account of events and feelings. Furthermore, our familiar notions of truth and reality are shaken due to the unreliable nature of Angela's narration; she is an elderly woman whose memory is fading - 'empiezen a blanquear con mi cabeza mis recuerdos'[7] and actually says she isn't sure if she dreamed the whole episode, 'yo no s lo que es verdad'[8 ]. However, in addition to this complication in the plot, Unamuno tries to confuse the reader in the final section of the novel. Not only does it insinuate that Angela is a fantasy character and suggest that fiction and reality are fundamentally the same thing, but it implies that everything in the text is, although fictional, also somehow true – 'esta realidad no se me ocurre dudar; I create in her the ms that creates the holy mystery; I create in her what I create in my own reality"[9]. This leaves the reader to ponder the idea that Don Manuel represents a significant Truth and, in this way, is more real than Unamuno himself. Yet at the same time we are left with an unreliable narrative, a subjective account of feelings and events that leave us with the unsettling sense that we cannot reach a kernel of certainty, that the truth is kept frustratingly out of reach. These different levels of truth are often used in novels of the post-realist era, perhaps because writers no longer believed in the objective, stable reality they were writing about; instead, they represented subjective realities that had to do with individual consciousness and perception. Unamuno's choice to question the narrator's authority and use metafiction forces the reader to think about the relationship between fiction and reality in a time of political and social upheaval. Many critics of Unamuno's works argue that San Manuel Bueno, martir is an accurate representation of his beliefs on the truth of life and religion, however, in one of his most famous statements, he said that everyone should face the miserable fact of our existence mortal at all costs, even if it means sacrificing our happiness[10]. While Don Manuel wants to keep people ignorant because that means they can lead their lives contentedly, Unamuno has dedicated much of his life and work to shaking his readers out of their complacency and forcing them, not only to face the tragic nature of human life condition, but also to question the fictitious truth he was presenting to them. By providing the reader with an 'artistic document' in the form of San Manuel Bueno, martyr, he invites him to search for the truth within the story, knowing full well that the reader will never be able to find the truth because everything said is subjective and a matter of perception rather than containing a higher literary truth. The fact that the 1930.