Campo Cerrado. El laberinto mágico Vol. I / The Magic Labyrinth
Novel , 1944
Cuadernos del Vigía
Pages: 272
This colossal project by the German-born writer Max Aub on the Spanish Civil War combines reality with fictitious events.
Laberinto mágico was written in the form of a saga, published between 1943 and 1967, and focuses on the Spanish Civil War and its consequences. Max Aub himself knew at first hand the hardships of the conflict, so much so that after spending time in France and Algeria he went into exile in Mexico where he wrote this magnum opus.
The saga comprises six novels: Campo cerrado (1943), Campo de sangre (1945), Campo abierto (1951), Campo del Moro (1963), Campo francés (1965) and Campo de los almendros (1967), as well as another 25 short stories describing various episodes in the conflict, and combining real and fictitious elements.
One of the most characteristic features of the work is the way in which it is written, in a style resembling a film script which alternates between documentary and fiction.