The Tragic Humus of the "School of Madrid"

Ortega and Its Effects on the Poetic Reason in Zambrano and the "Gigantomaquia" of History

Abstract

The present work tries to briefly analyze the concept of tragic “humus” that Ortega was able to transmit – consciously or not – to his disciples, during the well-known School of Madrid. For this, and secondly, we maintain that this Orteguian
“humus” can be revealed from the ideas of Hayden White. Thirdly, we propose how these Orteguian ideas were deployed in María Zambrano and José Gaos, and we maintain that they did so from their conceptions of poetic reason and a certain gigantomachy of
history – respectively –, which not only faithfully reflected those ideas but also took a step beyond the Orteguian proposal. Finally, we will try to show what are the Zambranian and Gaosian characteristics of this tragic conception of philosophy, which will go far beyond traditionalist European rationalism.