His best known work La República española en 1.91... (1911) fairly accurately predicted the advent of the Republic, its sectarian politics, collapse of public order and the ensuing military coup.

Politically Cirici remained a Carlist; he advanced the Traditionalist outlook both in his novels and in his press work, though he did not hold any post in the party and his attempts to obtain a seat in the Cortes ended in failure.

[12] None of the sources consulted indicates whether he entered a university or graduated; since his early teens he contributed to local periodicals and when in 1897 he settled on his own in Barcelona it was because he commenced professional career as a journalist.

[23] The granddaughter of Cirici Ventalló, Carmen Cirici-Ventalló Aguayo, earned her name in Mexico as music producer, painter, sculptor and translator, but also as wife of Eduardo Mata.

[47] In 1910 latest Cirici joined its staff[48] and specialized in coverage of parliamentarian debates; the section he invented and ran, Del Mentidero, mocked the deputies and became enormously popular among readers;[49] it was continued until 1914.

Though still redactor-jefe of Correo,[68] he became the most recognized pen of Herrera Oria’s newspaper; apart from commentaries he worked as envoy[69] and interviewed key politicians, e.g. Antonio Maura.

[76] Following commercial success of especially República Cirici adhered to the same genre of political fiction[77] when in 1914 he published El secreto de lord Kitchener.

The narrative followed the future course of the war and ended with total defeat of the Entente; France was overrun, Britain lost almost all its overseas possessions, Germany obtained sort of Gibraltar in Kent and became the unchallenged European might, federated with Belgium and Poland.

[79] Among many real-life personalities, also the foreign ones, again Liberal and Republican Spanish politicians were portrayed as lousy, mischievous failures; Kitchener was killed by an outraged suffragette.

However, he is eventually outsmarted by equally cynical collaborators and malicious wife; Anfrúns dies when involved in half-legal war supplies to the French army.

[103] His candidacy, apparently enforced by the national party executive, caused a minor turmoil in the provincial Lerida jefatura, which objected to both a cuckoo candidate and to the alliance strategy.

[104] Cirici's political activity fell on a period marked by growing paralysis of Carlism, torn by conflict between Vazquéz de Mella and Don Jaime; it very much focused on control of El Correo Español.

On the other hand, in 1913 Don Jaime favored him for the post of editor-in-chief against the candidacy of Miguel Peñaflor, advanced and eventually successfully secured by de Mella.

[106] Moreover, during the Great War Cirici sided with de Mella and assumed a decisively pro-German stand, definitely against the neutralist or pro-Entente leaning of Don Jaime.

[110] The Republican and Socialist authors criticized and derided him[111] as "campeón del cinismo";[112] his vehemence cost him a judicial investigation triggered by a French ambassador[113] and periodical suspension of El Debate,[114] he also became a point of reference for zealous germanophilia.

[115] As a novelist he was acclaimed for style[116] and wit,[117] by some declared "una de las más legitimas glorias del humorismo mundial" and the one who introduced political satire to Spain;[118] however, it is difficult to tell opinion of informed literary critics from marketing.

Many titles launched a charity campaign intended to help the widow and the orphans[129] and Alfonso XIII arranged for his oldest son to be admitted to the college free of charge.

[130] In the 1920s he was noted in works on history of Spanish literature as the author of "novelas de satira política con gran conocimiento del asunto, donaire y originalidad";[131] in 1931, when the Republic was actually declared, some recollected his earlier fiction.

[132] Today the favorable opinion held by scholars like Cejador y Frauca does not stand; most historians of literature ignore him[133] and he is relegated to footnotes in works dealing with specific genres.

[144] Rather exceptionally he featured in Carlist propaganda of the 1960s, listed among key party men of letters like Manuel Polo y Peyrolón or Luis Hernando de Larramendi.