Azaña, Manuel (mänwĕl` äthä`nyä), 1880–1940, Spanish statesman. An author and critic, he gained prominence as president (1930) of the Madrid Ateneo, a literary and political club, and came to the fore as a revolutionary political leader in 1931. He was minister of war in the first republican cabinet, and premier (1931–33) under President Alcalá Zamora. While premier, he pressed for social, military, and educational reforms and established himself as the principal figure of the democratic forces in Spain. His coalition was defeated in the Nov., 1933, elections, but he played a major role in bringing about the victory of the Popular Front in Feb., 1936. He again became premier, but, discouraged by the increasing polarization of his country, in May, 1936, after the ousting of Alcalá Zamora, he allowed himself to be elected to the less important office of president. He nominally headed the Loyalist government through the civil war, but, increasingly isolated from the now dominant working class forces, he did not play an important role in it. In Feb., 1939, he fled to France just before organized Loyalist resistance in Spain collapsed.

Bibliography

See his eloquent diary (4 vol., 1964).

Azaña (y Díaz), Manuel

Mauñel Azaña y Díaz, detail of an oil painting by J.M. López Mezquita, …

(credit: Courtesy of the Hispanic Society of America, New York)

(born Jan. 10, 1880, Alcalá de Henares, Spain—died Nov. 4, 1940, Montauban, France) Spanish prime minister and president. As prime minister from 1931 to 1933, he attempted to fashion a moderately liberal government. Elected president in May 1936, he was able to accomplish little before the Spanish Civil War broke out in July. He lost control of policy and remained in office as only a figurehead until 1939, when he went into exile following the victory of the Nationalist forces of Francisco Franco.