Born Dec. 28, 1872, in San Sebastián; died Oct. 30,1956, in Madrid. Spanish writer; representative of the so-called Generation of 1898.
Baroja wrote approximately 100 novels grouped in cycles. The trilogies written before World War I (Basque Country, 1900–09; The Life of Fantasy, 1901–06; The Struggle for Life, 1904; and others) sharply criticized bourgeois reality. Baroja’s novels, especially those of the later period (the cycles The Cities, 1920; The Agony of Our Time, 1926; Memoirs of a Man of Action, 1913—35; and others), are characterized by social pessimism. Baroja lived outside the country from 1936 to 1939. After his return to Spain, he joined the passive opposition to the Franco regime (see his memoirs From the Last Bend in the Road, vols. 1–7, 1944–49).