‘Hemos ido a redimir al redentor’: The Old ‘Paleto’ As Mentor in Miguel Delibes’ "El disputado voto del Señor Cayo" (1978)

• Durán Giménez-Rico, Isabel ^[1]
  1. [1] Universidad Complutense de Madrid

     Universidad Complutense de Madrid

     Madrid, España

     
• Localización: Bulletin of Spanish Studies, ISSN-e 1478-3428, ISSN 1475-3820, Vol. 99, Nº 4, 2022 (Ejemplar dedicado a: Ageing Men and Masculinities in Contemporary Spanish Literature), págs. 579-598
• Idioma: inglés
• DOI: 10.1080/14753820.2022.2096283
• Enlaces
  • Texto completo
• Resumen

  • "El disputado voto del Señor Cayo" (1978), a novel by Miguel Delibes, is constructed around a road trip, in which a candidate for a political party in the 1977 Spanish elections and two militants travel to a remote Castilian village in order to gain Mr Cayo’s vote. In this article I provide a reading of the candidate’s journey into ‘deep Spain’ as an example of the ‘Hero’s Journey’ monomyth, and focus on the character of the old ‘paleto’, a naturally ‘wise old man’ whom the politicians try to ‘redeem’, only to find that they are the ones to be redeemed.