Juan Valera y Alcala Galiano

Who was Juan Valera y Alcala Galiano?

Juan Valera y Alcalá-Galiano, was a Spanish realist author, diplomat, and politician.

He was born at Cabra, in the province of Córdoba, and was educated at Málaga and at the University of Granada, where he took his degree in law, and then entered upon a diplomatic career. Over the next five decades, Valera filled a number of positions in a variety of places. He accompanied the Spanish Ambassador to Naples. Afterwards, he was a member of the Spanish legations at Lisbon, Rio de Janeiro, Dresden and St. Petersburg. He wrote about the latter mission in Cartas desde Rusia, poking "gentle fun" at his fellow diplomat Mauricio Álvarez de las Asturias Bohorques y Guiráldez, the third Duke of Gor. After his return to Madrid, he became one of the editors of the liberal journal El Contemporáneo, and was appointed Minister to Frankfurt. After the revolution of 1868 he was appointed Assistant Secretary of State and Director of Public Instruction. During the reign of Alphonso XII he was Minister to Lisbon, Washington, and Brussels, and in 1893-95 Ambassador to Vienna. He was elected to the Academy of Moral and Political Sciences in 1900.