Bilbao, 1951.
Poet, novelist, essayist, translator and teacher. He was born in Bilbao, in the Casco Viejo, and as he himself acknowledges, he is part of a large family:
‘I was born in Bilbao on 6 March 1951 into a large family - we were many cousins - in which ideologically there was everything: nationalists, ETA supporters, Carlists in the Navarrese branch. They were all united by traditional views of life, in the religious sense, and the values of the media. I learned to read when I was two or three years old. ’
El Mundo, 5 May 2006.
He first studied in a religious centre and then Opus Dei opened his first school: Gaztelueta. At the age of 16 he joined ETA (where he remained until 1974) and then the Communist Party, Euskadiko Ezkerra and, finally, the PSOE-PSE. Nowadays, by his own admission, he maintains a conservative attitude in politics (for example, he is on the Honorary Board of Trustees of the Foundation for the Defence of the Spanish Nation) and participates in movements against ETA (Ermua Forum, Basta Ya,...).
As a child, and later as a teenager, his grandfather influenced Juaristi. He encouraged him to express himself in Basque and offered him an extraordinary library with a great deal of Basque literature. He lived with his grandfather from the age of 13 due to arguments with his father. He studied Romance philology at the University of Deusto, at which time he published his only work in Basque: Euskararen ideologiak. Etorkiak (1976) and in 1977 he formed part of the Pott Band together with Bernardo Atxaga, Joseba Sarrionandia, Manu Ertzilla, Josemari Iturralde and Ruper Ordorika. Juaristi, influenced by Gabriel Aresti, studied the poet's work and translated it into Spanish. As a researcher of Basque literature, in 1987, he published the work Literatura vasca (Basque Literature).
After working in several schools and institutes, he began to teach at the University of the Basque Country, later founding the chair of Spanish Philology. Driven by the political situation, he was one of ETA's targets, left the Basque Country and took up the Rey Juan Carlos I chair at New York University in 1997 and has been a research professor at the University of Mexico (Colegio de México), he has also held the chair of Contemporary Thought at the Cañada Blanch Foundation at the University of Valencia and since 2005 he has been a professor at the University of Alcalá de Henares.
He knows six languages and can read in more.
‘I know Basque, English, French, Portuguese and Galician. I am also fluent in Catalan and at the moment I am very advanced in Serbo-Croat, the language of my current wife and my youngest son. ‘ (Commented in El Mundo.)
Alongside Jon Juaristi's political and academic career, and related to it, we have his literary career. In the early 1980s he published several books of poems with the Pamiela publishing house in Navarre. They deal with love in everyday matters, or rather, lack of love: Diario de un poeta recién cansado (1986) and Suma de varia intención (1987), as well as Arte de marear (1989). After that, although he has worked in different genres, he has always had a place for poetry, and his poetic production has been constant: Los paisajes domésticos (1992), Mediodía (1993), Agradecidas señas (1995), Tiempo desapacible (1996), Poesía reunida (1986-1999) (2001), Prosas en verso (2002), Viento sobre las lóbregas colinas (2008) and Renta antigua (2012).
In his early works, along with poetry, the essay was of great importance. He studied the source of Basque national myths in his doctoral thesis, later El linaje de Aitor. The Invention of Basque Tradition (1984). He had previously published La leyenda de Jaun Zuria (1980) and with these books he gradually began to develop the genre that has been most successful in his literary creation and mentality. The Romantic Tradition. Basque legends of the 19th century (1986). Vestiges of Babel. Para una arqueología de lso nacionalismos (1992), El chimbo expiatorio. La invención de la tradición bilbaína. 1876-1939 (1994), El bucle melancólico. Histories of Basque nationalists (1997), Sacra nemesis. Nuevas historias de nacionalistas vascos (1999), Sermo humilis (1999), El bosque originario (2000), La tribu atribulada (2002), El reino del ocaso (2004), Voces para una enciclopedia interrumpida (2008) and A cambio del olvido (2011). Among all of them, El bucle melancólico. Stories of Basque nationalists. It was councillor Miguel Ángel Blanco who led him to write the book ‘In a fit of indignation and anger that lasted almost two months’. From the history of his family, he wrote the history of Basque nationalism, from the ideas of Sabino Arana to the mythological and psychopathological keys. For fourteen or fifteen hours he wrote over and over again every day, he concretised the criticism, he substantiated it. The book, which had already won the Espasa Essay Prize, was awarded the Spanish National Essay Prize in 1998.
Sacra Nemesis est publié deux ans plus tard. Dans Nuevas historias de nacionalistas vascos (Nouvelles histoires des nationalistes basques), il approfondit le sujet, en faisant remonter l'histoire des nationalistes jusqu'à l'accord d'Estella.
En 2006, il a écrit Cambio de destino. Des écrivains qui ont puisé dans l'essai, la réflexion, le roman et la poésie. En effet, en plus de tous les genres mentionnés ci-dessus, il a remporté le prix Azorín en 2007 avec le roman La caza salvaje. À cette occasion également, bien qu'il s'agisse d'un roman, le protagoniste est un prêtre basque de la jeltzale basque, sans scrupules, qui est présenté comme le personnage principal de ce roman d'aventure plongé dans le mensonge et la trahison.
En 2011, avec A cambio del olvido, Juaristi a remporté le 23e prix Comillas. Ici aussi, le roman et l'histoire vont de pair, puisqu'à travers la vie de trois familles, nous pouvons découvrir l'histoire de 1872 à 1942.
En janvier 2011, le lehendakari, Patxi López, a convoqué le Conseil consultatif basque pour recevoir les critiques de tous les partis nationalistes, car Juaristi avait déjà exprimé ses opinions anti-basques dans ses chroniques régulières dans les médias.
En 2014, il a remporté le prix Euskadi de littérature, Spacieux et triste dans le domaine des essais en espagnol. Pour les essais sur l'Espagne.
Sacra Nemesis published two years later. In Nuevas historias de nacionalistas vascos (New histories of Basque nationalists) he delved deeper into the subject, bringing the history of the nationalists to the Estella agreement.
In 2006 he wrote Cambio de destino. Writers who have drawn from essays, thought, novels and poetry. In fact, in addition to all the genres mentioned above, he won the Azorín prize in 2007 with the novel La caza salvaje. Also on this occasion, although it is a novel, the protagonist is a Basque priest from the Basque jeltzale, without scruples, who is presented as the main character of this adventure novel immersed in lies and betrayal.
In 2011, with A cambio del olvido, Juaristi won the 23rd Comillas Prize. Here, too, the novel and history go hand in hand, as through the lives of three families we can learn about the history of 1872 to 1942.
In January 2011, the lehendakari, Patxi López, convened the Basque Advisory Council to receive criticism from all the nationalist parties because Juaristi had already expressed his anti-Basque views in his regular columns in the media.
In 2014 he won the Euskadi Prize for Literature, Spacious and Sad in the field of essays in Spanish. For Essays on Spain.