Philosopher, essayist, dramatist, poet, novelist, Unamuno was an impassioned and unorthodox thinker whose novels foreshadow the works of Gabriel García Márquez, Mario Vargas Llosa, and Carlos Fuentes. Elegantly simple in language, these novels probe the elemental forces of human personality: In
Two Mothers
, the demonic will of a woman runs amok in a whirlwind of maternal power, and in
The Marquis of Lumbria
, another unforgettable heroine steers a violent course through the dense sea of tradition. By contrast,
Nothing Less Than a Man
, Unamuno’s most forceful piece of writing, focuses on a truly Nietzchean hero, a man who embodies human will deprived of spiritual strength.