Electra

Metadata

Gutenberg ID

28002

Title

Electra

Language

es

Book source

Project Gutenberg

Description max 80 words

Set in contemporary Madrid, this drama explores the tension between tradition and modernity through the story of Electra, a spirited orphan haunted by her scandalous mother's past. As she navigates love, family secrets, and societal expectations, Electra confronts the ghosts of history to find her own identity and voice.

Summary up to 500 words

Benito Pérez Galdós' *Electra* offers a profound examination of character, conscience, and the crushing weight of social history within the rigid structures of late 19th-century Spain. The narrative focuses on Electra, an eighteen-year-old orphan raised by the wealthy García Yuste family. Her guardians, particularly her aunt Evarista, harbor deep anxiety regarding her future, fearing she will inherit the scandalous reputation and moral failings of her mother, Eleuteria. Despite her mother's eventual reformation and death in a convent, Electra's upbringing is shadowed by the fear that she is a 'monster' in the making. The play opens in the opulent home of the Garcías, where Electra is depicted as mischievous, intelligent, and electrically alive. She is the object of affection for Máximo, the family's nephew, a brilliant mathematician and scientist whom society suspiciously dubs 'the prodigious magician.' However, Electra's mind is fragile. When Pantoja, Máximo's friend and a man of deep spiritual conviction, attempts to explain the tragic history of her mother to her, the young girl becomes overwhelmed. She cannot reconcile the innocent child she knows with the 'monster' of her mother's past. This psychological fracture leads to a dramatic climax. Electra flees into the garden, crying out for her mother and rejecting the conventional world of husbands and children. She retreats to a grotto, surrounded by children, lost in a delirium where she hears her mother's voice calling her to death or truth. The play culminates in a tense confrontation involving the entire household, the local convent, and conflicting forces: Máximo's passionate love, Pantoja's spiritual gravity, and the family's desperate desire to protect Electra's future. Through this crisis, Galdós examines the burden of history on the individual, the nature of redemption, and the struggle for liberty and light in a society clinging to old shadows. The drama ultimately questions whether a person can truly escape the sins of their ancestors or if the past inevitably dictates the future.

LLM editorial rating

4.2/5

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data/epubs/pg28002.epub

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Categories

• Classics
• Drama