The purpose of my dissertation is to study the discovery of the Castilian landscape as the nucleus of Spanish national identity at the end of the nineteenth century since this landscape perceived as the backbone of the Spanish identity was a principal inspiration for writers and artists of the time. / text

Esta tesis Doctoral pretende delimitar el corpus cuentístico de la extensa obra de José Martínez Ruiz ("Azorín") y ofrecer un estudio diacrónico de tales narraciones. El trabajo consta de dos partes. En la primera, ha sido revisada la noción de cuento literario a la luz de los planteamientos más modernos, realizando una sucinta historia del relato breve español hasta 1898. La segunda-necesariamente más amplia- es un estudio de los cuentos de José Martínez Ruiz. Siguiendo su propia concepción del género-tan susceptible de cambios con el correr de los años- y la que nos dieron prestigiosos azorinista, hemos estudiado más de seiscientos relatos. A través de ellos, descubriremos a un autor que conocía muy bien la tradición cuentística, pero que, a su vez, fue capaz de trazar nuevos y arriesgados caminos para el cuento actual / This Doctoral Thesis intends to detemine the tale corpus within José Martínez Ruiz ("Azorín")'s extensive work and offer a diachronic study of such narrations. The essay consists of two parts. In the first part, the notion of the literray tale has been revised, taking into account the most modern approaches and establishing a succinct view of Spanish short stories until 1898. The second part, wich is necessarily extensive, is a study of José Martínez Ruiz's tales. We have studied over 600 stories, following his own conception of the genre- so likely to change within the course of time- along with the conception provided by some of his most prestigious followers. Through his stories, we discover an author who had a vast knowledge of the traditional tale, yet who nevertheless was able to create new and risky paths for the contemporany tale.