El sueño de Geroncio

John Henry Newman

May 2003 · Encuentro

About this ebook

Edición bilingüe. Introducción, traducción y notas de Gabriel Insausti. El sueño de Geroncio es antes que nada eso: un sueño. Un sueño -como el propio nombre Geroncio indica- sobre la ancianidad y la proximidad de la muerte, que tan conscientemente sentía Newman en el momento de escribirlo. El sueño de Geroncio es sin duda un documento de valor teológico y poético, pero también el testimonio sincero y estremecedor de un hombre que empieza a vislumbrar el enfrentamiento definitivo con el destino de su alma. Sin duda Newman lo habría tenido presente durante toda su vida -no hay que olvidar que era un asceta-, pero el hecho es que no escribió Geroncio a los veinticinco años, sino a la muy significativa edad de sesenta y cuatro, con la intuición inmediata de su mortalidad. Y mortales somos todos, pero Geroncio era -antes que ningún otro- el propio Newman. El tema de Geroncio es, pues, la muerte, desde una perspectiva religiosa, no como aniquilación sino como tránsito hacia otro estado: el protagonista inicial, Geroncio, es suplantado por el alma de Geroncio. Auténtico monumento a la esperanza, estamos ante una de las obras maestras de la poesía inglesa de todos los tiempos, que ofrecemos por primera vez al lector español en edición bilingüe.

About the author

English clergyman John Henry Newman was born on February 21, 1801. He was educated at Trinity College, University of Oxford. He was the leader of the Oxford movement and cardinal after his conversion to the Roman Catholic Church. In 1822, he received an Oriel College fellowship, which was then the highest distinction of Oxford scholarship, and was appointed a tutor at Oriel. Two years later, he became vicar of St. Mary's, the Anglican church of the University of Oxford, and exerted influence on the religious thought through his sermons. When Newman resigned his tutorship in 1832, he made a tour of the Mediterranean region and wrote the hymn "Lead Kindly Light." He was also one of the chief contributors to "Tracts for the Times" (1833-1841), writing 29 papers including "Tract 90", which terminated the series. The final tract was met with opposition because of its claim that the Thirty-nine Articles of the Church of England are aimed primarily at the abuses of Roman Catholicism. Newman retired from Oxford in 1842 to the village of Littlemore. He spent three years in seclusion and resigned his post as vicar of St. Mary's on October 9, 1845. During this time, he wrote a retraction of his criticisms of the Roman Catholic Church and after writing his "Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine," he became a Roman Catholic. The following year, he went to Rome and was ordained a priest and entered the Congregation of the Oratory. The remainder of Newman's life was spent in the house of the Oratory that he established near Birmingham. He also served as rector of a Roman Catholic university that the bishops of Ireland were trying to establish in Dublin from 1854-1858. While there, he delivered a series of lectures that were later published as "The Idea of a University Defined" (1873), which says the function of a university is the training of the mind instead of the giving of practical information. In 1864, Newman published "Apologia pro Vita Sua (Apology for His Life)" in response to the charge that Roman Catholicism was indifferent to the truth. It is an account of his spiritual development and regarded as both a religious autobiography and English prose. Newman also wrote "An Essay in Aid of a Grammar of Assent" (1870), and the novels "Loss and Gain" (1848), Callista" (1856) and "The Dream of Gerontius" (1865). Newman was elected an honorary fellow of Trinity College, Oxford, in 1877 and was made cardinal by Pope Leo XIII in 1879. He died on August 11, 1890.