[Coronation] describes the last months in the life of Misiá Elisa Grey de Abalas, a woman of ninety-four, once a great beauty, now a bedridden skeleton attended by two aging but faithful servants, Rosario and Lourdes. She claims to be descended from royalty, and insists that she is a saint as well as a queen. Her saintliness, however, is intermittent, for she has terrible fits of temper in which her language becomes "obscene, virulent, desperate."…

Almost the only person to share with the devoted servants the responsibility for looking after Misiá Elisa is her grandson, Don Andrés…. Now in his fifties, Don Andrés has his own apartment, but from time to time, however reluctantly, he visits the old lady. Largely because of her influence, he has grown up to be afraid of life and has withdrawn himself from it as far as possible. (p. 27)

The book might be regarded as an account of the decay of the upper class. Misiá Elisa, so old, so useless, so given to self-deception, so quick to inflict pain on others, could be taken as a symbol, with Andrés displaying the impotence of his class. (pp. 27-8)

Donoso, it is clear, takes a dark view of the human condition, and yet the book does not succeed in giving the reader a tragic sense of life. This is in part because the author relies so heavily on direct analysis of psychological states. The portrayal of Don Andrés, in particular, is close to a case history of regression. Despite the fact that the author has studied in America and teaches English literature, he seems to be under the influence of the French psychological novel.

In part, however, he is quite successful. Misiá Elisa in her bad mood is the incarnation of malice…. The old servants provide an effective sort of chorus, and one can only be amused by their high jinks at the end. (p. 28)