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RESEARCH PRODUCT

Spanish History in The Fairy Country: Dealing with Social Trauma in 'Pan's Labyrinth'

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Resumen: La celebrada El laberinto del fauno (Del Toro, 2006) pone en escena un cuento de hadas situado en los convulsos tiempos de la primera posguerra civil espanola. La critica ha senalado las dificultades para evaluar la conflictiva relacion entre historia y fantasia en el ambiguo final feliz de la pelicula, y ha tratado de relacionar la moraleja final con el trauma de la Guerra Civil. En este trabajo, preferimos leer el film a la luz de otro trauma social, el que marca el momento de su produccion. Si tenemos en cuenta que la Transicion de una dictadura fascista a una monarquia parlamentaria no ha sido abierta ni pacificamente debatida en las decadas siguientes y que cierto silencio sobre este tema persiste todavia hoy; es posible entender la pelicula como una forma de abordar algunos asuntos pendientes de la cultura espanola contemporanea. Palabras Clave : Laberinto del Fauno , Del Toro, Trauma Social, Memoria Historica, Transicion Espanola, Cultura Espanola. Abstract: The successful film El laberinto del fauno (Del Toro, 2006) presents a fairy tale set in the convulsive times of the Spanish Civil War’s aftermath. The scholarship on this film already established the difficulties inherent in evaluating the conflictive relation between history and fantasy in the movie’s ambiguous happy ending and has tried to relate the film's moral with the social trauma of the Civil War. In this essay, we chose to read the film in the light of another social trauma, that which marked the moment of its production. Considering that the Transition from a fascist dictatorship to a parliamentary monarchy has not been openly and peacefully discussed in the subsequent decades, and that a tense silence in regards to this topic continues to this very day, it is possible to understand the movie as an attempt to address some unfinished business in contemporary Spanish culture. Key Words: Pan’s Labyrinth , Del Toro, Social Trauma, Historical Memory, Spanish Transition, Spanish Culture.