Pedro Antonio de Alarcón

Born Mar. 10, 1833, in Guadix, Granada Province; died July 10, 1891, in Valdemoro, Madrid Province. Spanish writer.

Alarcón began his career with poetry written in the romantic vein. His most important works are three collections of short stories— National Stories (1881), Love Stories (1881), and Unlikely Stories (1882)—among which are to be found examples of critical realism. Alarcón continued the democratic trends of Spanish literature, but in his novels The Scandal (1875), Baby With a Ball (1880), and The Loose Woman (1882) he propagated Roman Catholic ideas, arguing against all manifestations of freethinking.