Youth and Egolatry

Po Baroja y Nessi (1872 1956) was a Spanish Basque writer and a novelist of the Generation of 98. Baroja was trained as a physician, managed the family bakery and twice ran unsuccessfully for the Spanish parliament. As a young man Baroja believed in anarchistic ideals. He later would derive into a simple admiration of men of action. His view of life was pessimistic. He was in disfavor with Catholic and traditional thinkers. During the Spanish Civil War of 1936-39 he was often in danger. In the 1890s Spain was awakening to reform. The monarchy was trying to balance between too much reform and not enough. The people wanted social change and equality. Novelists, poets and essayists appeared who had never been heard of before full of exciting ideas from other lands and of their own. Out of this tumultuous time came new writers with exciting new works. Baroja was one of these. Youth and Egolatry was translated from the Spanish by Jacob S. Fassett Jr. and Frances L. Phillips. The volume contains essays of an autobiographical nature.