Mario Góngora del Campo was one of the most famous and brilliant historians of the Chilean 20th century. He was also a prominent intellectual, who sometimes participated in public debate from the level of ideas and historical knowledge. In 1981 he published his famous, stimulating and controversial Historical essay on the notion of state in Chile in the 19th and 20th centuries (Ediciones La Ciudad), which generated a great discussion.
A few years later, on November 18, 1985, he died after being run over at the gates of the Campus Est of the Catholic University of Chile, where he taught. Still a year after his departure, it is worth returning to his figure: on this occasion we can retrace his phase as a young university student, who shows a very rich cultural background, which largely explains his subsequent professional career .
Góngora was born in 1915 and later studied at the Colegio San Agustín. In defining his university studies he opted for a law degree, precisely at the Catholic University. He really didn’t have that calling, and while he was a brilliant student, he was never going to practice law.
On the contrary, from before the age of twenty he began to manifest a characteristic that would define his personal and professional life: he was a voracious and sophisticated reader, capable of devouring several works a week and a month. Fortunately we have detailed information about it because Góngora himself decided to make some notes that were published under the title of Daily (Santiago, Editorial Universitaria/Ediciones UC, 2013, with a critical edition by Leonidas Morales), covering his readings between 1934 and 1937.
At that time, the young man’s intellectual interests were manifold: poetry and philosophy, theology and history, literature and political thought. In 1934 – at the age of just 19, to cite only the first to appear in the book – he read Berdiaeff, Goethe, Shakespeare, Lope de Vega, Ortega y Gasset, Chesterton, Dostoevskij, Maritain, Mariátegui, Bernanos, Balzac, Saint Thomas Aquinas , Romano Guardini, Claudel, St. Ignatius of Loyola, Francisco de Vitoria, Menéndez Pelayo, Ramiro de Maeztu, Alfonso X, Amado Nervo, Stefan Zweig, Cervantes, Rilke and, by the way, the Bible.
Some Chileans also appear, such as Fernández Concha, Francisco Antonio Encina, the priest Alfredo Silva Santiago and Vicente Pérez Rosales. Note that we have left out of this list the years 1935, 1936 and 1937, when the readings multiplied in parallel with the studies of Law.
On another level, Góngora was a Catholic of great religious depth, who at a certain point also thought of the priesthood and who had a great knowledge of Church doctrine. He also manifested political interests, which soon turned into disappointment, even though he managed to direct the magazine lyricof the young conservatives of the future National Falange.
On one occasion he published a lauded political speech: “Spiritual foundations of the new order” (1937). The concepts expressed on that occasion were the reflection not only of political thought, but also of a deeper conception of life, which was present in the 1930s and which are reflected very well in the excellent book by Diego González Cañete. , A revolution of the spirit. Politics and hope in Frei, Eyzaguirre and Góngora in the interwar years (Santiago, Bicentenary Studies Center, 2018).
Although Mario Góngora stood out for his intelligence and doctrinal training, he is also a reflection of his time. There are many precedents which indicate that the 1930s were especially vital in terms of ideas and prolific in various political and cultural projects.
This allows us to appreciate a great diffusion of books, magazines, groups and conversations, which in practice show us the irruption of a generation full of a sense of its historical time, of mysticism and of a vocation to transform the world. It could be seen in the young socialists, conservatives and Falangists, Nazis and others who began to populate the political and cultural milieu of those years.
in the pages of Daily de Góngora, one perceives at various moments a tormented, shy and lonely soul. We appreciate love and vital problems, confusion about the way forward, many doubts and some certainties that fall away. It seems to me that the evolution of youth has been well explained by Patricia Arancibia in her book Mario Gongora. In Search of Himself 1915-1946 (Santiago, Mario Góngora Foundation, 1995).
He appears not only as a remarkable and studious young man, but also as a person who seeks political options from the conservative movement to the Communist Party, passing through the young Falangists; he goes from falling in love to disappointment; he yearns for holiness and experiences crises; he passionately reads and learns, but he knows that the way to happiness is not found there.
In any case, rereading Mario Góngora, or reviewing his career during his youth in the 1930s, allows us to delve deeper into the man and his times. It also helps us to look carefully at a way of understanding not only intellectual life, but also political activity and the way of living religion: in all cases it meant a vital, passionate and convinced commitment, in the certainty that life it’s short and worth giving for a cause.
On the other hand, one understands very clearly the need for an intellectual formation, at the highest possible level, each according to one’s own abilities and responsibilities: to develop a life in the university world, in political activity and in every form of service to society.
By the way, high-level intellectual training, lectures or cultural groups do not ensure that a country will be better. Nor do they exhaust the needs of preparing for public service in various sectors.
However, it is worth remembering the young Mario Góngora – and his generation of the Thirties – to return to reflect on political thought, historical experience, the wealth of novels, the depth of philosophy and the teachings that the various disciplines can offer only for a better understanding of the world and the country, but also for them to improve with our work and our commitment.
Alexander San Francesco, He is an academic of the University of San Sebastián and of the Catholic University of Chile. Director of the Res Pública Training Institute.
