It might be that This Sunday is too much like Coronation, not only in characters and milieu but even in some of the plotting. As a novel This Sunday comes off better. But what Donoso has been giving us (here and foreshadowed in some earlier stories, a few written originally in English) is the portrait of a decaying society, nostalgic for a glory that had never quite existed, with the other classes lacking the moral and psychological dominance to succeed except through violence. The relations between master and servant will elicit comparisons with the modern American South, but without the complication of race. The strength of the household servants, of the poor, of the criminal, is contrasted with the enervation of the well-to-do, but is insufficient for any real accomplishment.

But this cannot be said to be Donoso's theme. It will be apparent in This Sunday but becomes...