With the Passing of the Years: Existential Attitude in Unamuno, Onetti, and Toscana

Over the years, Existentialism has grown to be a recurrent subject in literature. As the world faced periods of war and rapid development in the 19th and 20th centuries, authors with various origins began to present―almost universal―anxiety in their writing. Researchers have previously discovered patterns between basic existential notions and main narratives in novels, essays, and short stories such as Duelo por Miguel Pruneda (2002), “El Pozo” (1939), El Último Lector (2003), “Los Adioses” (1954), Niebla (1914), and Vida de Don Quijote y Sancho (1905). Although previous studies have analyzed existential concepts on prominent literary pieces, further research that explores the connection between the portrayal of existential principles, culture, and generational differences and relates it to modern society is needed. This comparative study aims to examine the development of existential concepts through time in literary works of authors from diverse cultural backgrounds and periods, such as Miguel de Unamuno (1864-1936), Juan Carlos Onetti (1909-1994), and David Toscana (1961-), as an attempt to correlate their existential concerns to the ones of our present-day society. We developed an existential theoretical framework to conduct this research, including some of Hannah Arendt, Martin Heidegger, and Soren Kierkegaard's theories. As this project continues to progress, one of our goals strives to build an existential-cultural vision through literary texts. Moreover, this project seeks to demonstrate that, while the emphasis of some existential concepts in literary texts varies according to generational differences, Existentialism is still a constant concern for the contemporary writer