ABSTRACT
The nineteenth century was characterized by the proliferation of images in the enormous range of popular and intellectual publications that contributed to the rise of mass culture. Benito Pérez Galdos's adoption of the Realist and Naturalist aesthetics in the late 1870s, and the use of themes related to vision and blindness in several of his novels, most notably Marianela and Cánovas, situate the author's literary production plainly within a mass culture that was increasingly concerned with seeing Spain's present and envisioning its future. While only twenty of Galdós's novels were ever illustrated, sight as a metaphor of interpretation is prevalent throughout his writings as readers are frequently invited to "see" what the author or his narrators describe. The use of vision in the early Episodios, specifically in the Second Series, binds the historical novels to the broader visual culture of the early Restoration period, when official as well as popular art was dominated by academic history painting.
