d the sensuous, the formal, the
sentimental, even the intellectual aspects of verse with an admirable
variety of exquisite shades, lacking which most poetry seems
old-fashioned to the fastidious palate of modern men. Unamuno is too
genuine a representative of the spiritual and masculine variety of
Spanish genius, ever impervious to French, and generally, to
intellectual, influences, to be affected by the esthetic excellence of
this art. Yet, for all his disregard of the modern resources which it
adds to the poetic craft, Unamuno loses none of his modernity. He is
indeed more than modern. When, as he often does, he strikes the true
poetic note, he is outside time. His appeal is not in complexity but in
strength. He is not refined: he is final.

* * * * *

In the Preface to his _Tres Novelas Ejemplares y un Prologo_ (1921)
Unamuno says: " ... novelist--that is, poet ... a novel--that is, a
poem." Thus, with characteristic decision, he sides with the lyrical
conception of the novel. There is of course an infinite variety of
types of novels. But they can probably all be reduced to two
classes--_i.e._, the dramatic or objective, and the lyrical or
subjective, according to the mood or inspiration which predominates in
them. The present trend of the world points towards the dramatic or
objective type. This type is more in tune with the detached and
scientific character of the age. The novel is often nowadays considered
as a document, a "slice of life," a piece of information, a literary
photograph representing places and people which purse or time prevents
us from seeing with our own eyes. It is obvious, given what we now know
of him, that such a view of the novel cannot appeal to Unamuno. He is a
utilitarian, but not of worldly utilities. His utilitarianism transcends
our daily wants and seeks to provide for our eternal ones. He is,
moreover, a mind whose workings turn in spiral form towards a central
idea and therefore feels an instinctive antagonism to the dispersive
habits of thought and sensation which such detailed observation of life
usually entails. For at bottom the opposition between the lyrical and
the dramatic novel may be reduced to that between the poet and the
dramatist. Both the dramatist and the poet create in order to link up
their soul and the world in one complete circle of experience, but this
circle is travelled in opposite directions. The poet goes inwards first,
then out