Despite Emilia Pardo Bazán’s prominent feminism, La sirena negra has been
strangely overlooked by gender studies. When the novel was published in 1908,
Gómez de Baquero judged it “non feminist” due to its superficial heroines and the
centrality of its complex masculine characters. Academic studies of La sirena negra
have not refuted this idea, since they have elided gender approaches to focus on its
decadent aesthetics. This article argues, on the contrary, that the novel’s androcentrism
can be read as a Pardo Bazan’s strategy to appropriate the patriarchal discourse
and hold it responsible for national degeneration. Emilia Pardo Bazán was harshly
affected by the fin-de-siècle crisis. In her opinion, Spanish decay came from a lack
of solid morality. Thus, Catholic principles should be restored because they would
provide the autoregulation mechanisms to regenerate and reassemble the country.
Literature should show the new reality, and the French roman psychologique provided
her with an appropriate model. La sirena negra sets out the problem of the
moral anomie through its protagonist, Gaspar de Montenegro. The analysis of his
sexuality and gender performance reveals the danger of this amoral behavior for the
degeneration of society, attributed ultimately to the patriarchal order and the androcentric
discourse.
