Los pretéritos en J. M. Gironella. ¿Influencia del catalán?

Abstract

In this work it is argued, with the analysis of massive data, to answer affirmatively to the question of the influence of Catalan on the uses of the past tenses in the work of Gironella. Simplifying, it is argued that, apart from the literary qualities of the study object (Gironella) and control object (Delibes) corpus, if the use of the preterite compounds, PPC, in Gironella surpass from that of Delibes (genuine Peninsular Castilian, Valladolid) and resembles, in excess, that of Lluïsa Forrellad (Catalan author like Gironella), and we have values, contrary to the trend noted in reference samples in the peninsular literature (Quijote, La Regenta), and even more contrary with respect to the trends of Spanish in America (from Argentina to Mexico), we must assume that this is due to the influence of Catalan on the use of the past tense. It is thus demonstrated and confirmed that the use of the PPC in the idiolect of Catalan authors of great diffusion, like Gironella, or of great literary prestige, like Forrellad, manifests the influence of Catalan on the variety of Spanish with a Catalan environment, by underlying circumvention of the forms of PS, canté, whose corresponding forms are no longer used in Catalan.