Orbits in conflict. José Ortega y Gasset - Alfonso Reyes. Correspondence (1915-1955). Part One

Abstract

José Ortega Gasset and Alfonso Reyes, two of the most important Spanish-speaking thinkers of the twentieth century, met each other in late 1914 in Madrid, where the Mexican was exiled because of the Mexican Revolution and in the middle of First World War. Between 1914 and 1924, Reyes lived in Madrid in frequent contact with Ortega, who invited him to join his journalistic enterprises (the weekly España, the newspapers El Imparcial, El Sol and the Revista de Occidente). Despite in 1947 Ortega broke up with him and with his old students now exiled in Mexico, Reyes was always grateful to Ortega. This article aims to introduce the correspondence between both thinkers, which extends for almost 40 years. It is the first time to be published as whole.