José Gil Fortoul

José Gil Fortoul (25 November 1861, in Barquisimeto, Lara – 15 June 1943, in Caracas) was a Venezuelan writer, historian, and politician, who was briefly the acting president of Venezuela. As a political scientist and legal scholar, he is closely identified with the movement of Venezuelan positivism. He was an ally of the dictator Juan Vicente Gómez, supporting his regime both politically and in his social and historical writing. He grew up and was educated in El Tocuyo, earning a Bachelor of Philosophy from the school La Concordia on 2 July 1880, under the supervision of Egidio Montesinos (es). This movement advanced modernism in Venezuela in the mid-19th century, and was simultaneously associated both with the development of institutions and the state as well as closeness with dictatorial regimes. Fortoul is remembered as a core exponent of the movement, both in terms of promoting modernism in Venezuela and in his close association with an authoritarian regime.

In 1915, Fortoul was a founder of the Venezuelan Academy of Political Science (es).

Selected works

1879: Infancia de mi Musa (Barquisimeto, Venezuela) 1887: Recuerdos de París (Barcelona, Spain) 1888: Julián (Leipzig, Germany) 1890: Filosofía Constitucional (Paris, France) 1891: Filosofía Penal (Brussels, Belgium) 1891: El Humo de mi Pipa (Paris, France) 1892: La Esgrima Moderna (Liverpool, England) 1892: ¿Idilio? (Liverpool, England) 1895: Pasiones (Paris, France) 1896: El Hombre y la Historia (Paris, France) 1909: Historia Constitucional de Venezuela (Berlin, Germany) 1915: Discursos y Palabras (Caracas, Venezuela) 1916: De Hoy para Mañana (Caracas, Venezuela) 1931: Sinfonía inacabada y otras variaciones (Caracas, Venezuela) 1944: Páginas de Ayer (posthumous).