page_title: José María Hinojosa Lasarte
section_title: Literary career
hierarchical_section_title: José María Hinojosa Lasarte / Literary career
context_page_description: José María Hinojosa Lasarte was a Spanish writer and political militant. As a man of letters he is considered one of the first if not the very first and the only genuinely surrealist poet in Spain, counted also among members of Generation ‘27. As a politician he acted in ultra-conservative realm, holding Carlist jefatura in Málaga and building Andalusian structures of the Agrarian party. Following more than half a century of oblivion, his memory and especially the circumstances of his death became a counter-reference to these of Lorca and are subject to politically-charged discussions.
context_section_description: In the early 1920s, Hinojosa began his career in Málaga with Emilio Prados as his literary mentor. In 1923, he co-founded Ambos, a literary review. Vaguely anchored in Andalusian rural myths it embraced aspects of the eclectic avant-garde, including dadaism, futurism and expressionism; apart from juvenile poems contributed by its founders, the periodical also printed works of García Lorca, Laffón Zambrano and Salazar Chapela. With circulation limited mostly to acquaintances, Ambos stopped after just 4 issues. Hinojosa's writing matured in Paris, where he joined the circle of young Spanish artists: apart from already befriended Prados and Lorca the group included Buñuel, Dalí and a number of later famous writers and painters. Though styled after Rimbaud, in terms of poetry Hinojosa was described as a surrealist; the poems he contributed to reviews like La Verdad or Verso y prosa, but especially the volumes he published in 1925–1927, are considered a stepping stone towards full literary maturity.
  Hinojosa's writings climaxed in 1928 with the publication of further two volumes, considered the peak embodiment of his surrealism. In the late 1920s, he got involved in Imprenta Sur, a friendly Málaga publishing house and especially in the launch of Litoral, another Málaga-based avant-gardist literary review. He contributed as editor and poet, specifically involved in the 1929 commemorative issue dedicated to Góngora; at that time he also engaged financially and entered the board; later Hinojosa intended to launch a strictly surrealist periodical. Due to his poetry and bohemian lifestyle but also because of somewhat anti-religious if not nearly blasphemous motives of his writings, in the local Málaga milieu he was already enjoying the reputation of an extravagant iconoclast. Hinojosa reinforced this image by staging social provocations scandalizing both iconic intellectuals like Valle-Inclan and plain rural Andalusians; he was willingly assisted by acquaintances like Dalí and his new female partner Gala. 
  Hinojosa's relations with his avant-garde group of companions remained ambiguous. Though admitted to their inner circle, behind his back and to some extent also up front he was ridiculed as a wealthy señorito and mocked as a poor author who fathered disastrous poetry, never really a genuine member of the group; Diego, Lorca, Dalí or Buñuel used to denigrate him. Many treated him as a sponsor rather than as a fellow writer; they stayed at his premises, travelled with him and dined at his cost, considering it useful to be on close terms with "bohemian with the current account"; some re-paid with own works, and this is how Hinojosa gatheredd a collection of paintings of Miró, Picasso, Gris, Dalí and Bores. Literary critique either ignored him or belittled him. It is not clear whether the complex setting contributed to the violent and apocalyptic tone of Hinojosa's last poetic volume, to be published in 1930, withdrawn from print and issued in early 1931. It turned out to be his farewell to belles-letres; according to some the poet decided to dump literature, "commit literary suicide" and not to look back.
caption: typical surrealist imagery
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