Benito Pérez Galdós (1843–1920) was a Spanish realist novelist and politician, and some scholars place him second only to Miguel de Cervantes among Spanish novelists. Among his novels are Fortunata y Jacinta and Marianela, and he also wrote plays, including Realidad from 1892. He sat as a deputy in the Madrid cortes and was nominated for the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1912.
