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Biography of Jacinto Benavente y Martinez
Name: Jacinto Benavente y Martinez
Birth Date: August 12, 1866
Death Date: July 14, 1954
Place of Birth: Madrid, Spain
Nationality: Spanish
Gender: Male
Occupations: dramatist, playwright
Jacinto Benavente y Martinez
The Spanish dramatist Jacinto Benavente y Martinez (1866-1954) was the most popular Spanish playwright of the first half of the 20th century. His sophisticated comedies of manners and of social satire signaled the beginning of modern theater in Spain.Jacinto Benavente was born in Madrid on Aug. 12, 1866, the youngest son of a prominent pediatrician. He grew up in an atmosphere of learning, wealth, and social ease. His father loved the theater, maintained a large library, and practiced among aristocratic families, writers, and actors. A precocious child, Benavente learned several languages by the age of 16 and delighted in visiting the circus and in performing plays for household servants and friends.In 1882 he enrolled in the University of Madrid to study law but gave up his studies 2 years later when his father died. Benavente lived an easy, comfortable life. He dressed elegantly, attended fashionable parties, and became a part of the refined but …showed first 150 words…
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…showed last 150 words…work of other Spanish writers of the Generation of 1898, avoided serious moral, religious, or social preoccupations. Thus it quickly became outmoded.During the second broad period of his life (1920-1954) Benavente traveled extensively to Latin America, the United States, and the Soviet Union. From 1936 to 1939 during the Spanish Civil War, he lived in Valencia. Upon his return to Madrid he publically endorsed the Franco regime to the dismay of his former liberal acquaintances. He died on July 14, 1954, in Madrid at the age of 88, having written and staged 172 plays. Further Reading Some of Benavente's plays are contained in Plays, by Jacinto Benavente (4 vols., 1917-1924), translated by John Garrett Underhill. The best book on Benavente is Marcelino C. Peñuelas, Jacinto Benavente (trans. 1968); it places the man and writer in his age, studies his relationship with the Spanish and European theater of his time, and gives a detailed analysis of his representative plays.
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