Ramón Pérez de Ayala y el paisaje de alta montaña

Ramón Pérez de Ayala (1880-1962) is among the few contemporary Spanish writers in whose texts mountainous landscape assumes a key role, mainly in his early works. Our analysis will take into account "Tinieblas en las cumbres" [Darkness at the Summit] (1907), primarily focusing on the nature awareness of Alberto Díaz de Guzmán, writer’s alter ego and main character in the whole Pérez de Ayala’s youth tetralogy. We shall also consider journalistic reportages written in 1916 by the Spanish author in the course of his assignment as special correspondent for newspapers La Prensa (Buenos Aires) and El Imparcial (Madrid) on the Alpine Italian frontline and during the Great War. Comparative analysis between texts provides us with valuable data that allows us to examine how Pérez de Ayala’s initial approach to the blind forces of nature, deeply rooted in the Latin and humanistic intellectual heritage, reveals in less than a decade a major turnaround influenced by Friedrich Nietzsche’s thought and Gabriele D’Annunzio’s lyric poetry.