Ortega y Gasset, << awr TAY guh ee gah SEHT, >> José (1883-1955), was a Spanish philosopher and essayist. His book Meditations on Quixote (1914) anticipated themes that Existentialist philosophers would popularize more than 10 years later. Existentialism is a philosophical movement that developed in Europe in the 1800’s and 1900’s. The movement is called Existentialism because most of its members are primarily interested in the nature of existence or being, by which they usually mean human existence (see Existentialism ). Ortega emphasized the idea that we are “condemned to be free” and therefore must determine our own places in history.
Ortega cherished upper-class values. He thought that without spiritual leadership from the top, society would be drawn down to the level of its lowest members. He explored this idea in his best-known book, The Revolt of the Masses (1930). In The Dehumanization of Art (1925), Ortega discussed the tendency of modern art to rid itself of human content.
Ortega was born in Madrid, Spain, on May 9, 1883. The philosophy of Immanuel Kant influenced Ortega strongly while he was studying in Germany. Ortega was professor of philosophy at Madrid University from 1910 to 1936. He went into exile in 1936 because of the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939) and returned to Spain in 1945. Ortega died on Oct. 18, 1955.
