post war there really was nada

Wow, Nada was an interesting, interesting read. It follows the story of a young girl post Spanish civil war moving to attend university. Our protagonist Andrea moves in with her extended family who seems to have lost almost everything due to the war, given that they were quite well off before the war. I really enjoyed how the author was able to weave this feeling of despair throughout the whole novel essentially showing a day/life of a student in Spain following the civil war, and really showing the actual impacts that could otherwise be forgotten. Andrea even mentions how Barcelona is different than what she remembers, showing the lasting impacts of the war.

Overall, I really liked how this book was written/translated. I was able to get pretty immersed into the emotions portrayed and it was easy to keep up with (improvement shown from Proust – woohoo).

Something that really stood out to me was the focus on art in this novel. In our day to day life pursuing the arts is commonly seen as a waste of time and money, with many people questioning the importance of arts. I found it really impactful how in Nada it is post civil war, with the country in ruins and people are pursuing arts. It shows to me the importance of arts in humanity! For example her uncles Juan (a painter) and Roman (a musician – and a spy i guess) both have artistic jobs. Pons also has a social group filled with artists and various philosophers. And above all our protagonist, Andrea who is pursuing literature. A fact which seeps through the words in the novel to show her perspective, as she seems to view everything in an artistic sense. I also thought Nada was very interesting because of how unique it is in some ways. For example Ena dates Roman, but she doesnt do this due to her young love instead it is for revenge (first of all this is so gross like he literally dated her mom too). I thought this wasn’t typical because usually a female character is shown falling head over heels and losing her senses in love, but in story it’s almost reversed. Some other parts of the story made me uncomfortable (as I am guessing they were written to), for example when Juan abuses his wife. I also kind of thought of Nada as story of hope and reality in some ways! A story which doesn’t really end properly as in the end she goes off somewhere and begins a new cycle.

Question; How is the title – Nada – represented throughout the story. In what ways does Nada happen?