World Lit Report

Contents [hide]
1 Early Spanish Literature and the Middle Ages
1.1 Jarchas
1.2 Poema del Cid
1.3 Mester de Juglaría
1.4 Mester de Clerecía
1.5 Spanish Prose
1.6 Lyric Poetry of the Middle Ages
2 The Renaissance
3 The Baroque
4 The Enlightenment
5 The Romanticism
6 Realism
7 Modernist literature
8 20th century literature

The Renaissance
Main article: Spanish Renaissance literature
During the 15th century the pre-Renaissance occurs. The literary production increased exponentially. Some outstanding poets of this century are Juan de Mena and Íñigo López de Mendoza (Marquess of Santillana). The Spanish literature of the Middle Ages concludes with the work La Celestina by Fernando de Rojas.

In the Renaissance important topics are: the Renaissance poetry, with Garcilaso de la Vega and Juan Boscán; the religious literature, with Fray Luis de León, San Juan de la Cruz, and Santa Teresa de Jesús; and the Renaissance prosa, with the anonymous El Lazarillo de Tormes. The principal features of the Renaissance were the revival of learning based on classical sources, the rise of courtly patronage, the development of perspective in painting, and the advancements of science.

The most important characteristics of the Renaissance are:

The language in this epoch is dominated by the naturality and simplicity, which avoids the affectation, the amaneramiento and the over-searched phrase. Thus the vocabulary and the syntax will be simple.
The preferred themes are, fundamentally, the love, conceived from the platonic point of view; the nature, as somewhat idyllic (bucolic); the pagan mythology, from which the histories of gods and the female beauty are reflected, following always the same classical ideal. In relation to these themes mentioned, various Renaissance points exist, some of them taken from the classical world:
The Carpe Diem, whose translation would be "catch the day" or "take advantage of the moment". It advises the enjoyment of the life before the arrival of the old age.
The female beauty, described always following the same plan: blond youth, of serene, clear eyes, of white skin, red lips, rosy cheeks, etc.
The Beatus Ille or praise of the life in the field, apart from the material things, as opposed to the life in the city, with its dangers and intrigues.
The Locus Emoenus or description of a perfect and idyllic nature.


***The Renaissance and the Golden Age of Spanish Literature***
The first known novel of chivalry, Amadis of Gaul, was printed in Zaragoza in 1508 and served as a model for the novels of chivalry that became (16th cent.) the most popular genre in Spain, together with the anonymous ballads (romances) that were sung and recited everywhere. Meanwhile the spirit of the Renaissance had been invading Spanish letters, and Spain had also become a dominant European power. In the reign of Emperor Charles V, the first picaresque novel, Lazarillo de Tormes, was published (1554); the identity of its author has remained a mystery.

The latter part of the 16th cent. and most of the 17th cent. made up the great era of Spanish literature, known as the Golden Age. At the start of this period the poet Garcilaso de la Vega, stimulated by the work of Juan Boscán Almogáver, succeeded in mastering the meter and essence of Italian verse and in acclimating it to the Spanish spirit, thus revolutionizing Spanish poetry. The chief prose monument of the Golden Age, and one of the masterpieces of world literature, is the novel Don Quixote de la Mancha by Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra. The picaresque novel flourished; notable examples are those of Mateo Alemán and Francisco de Quevedo. Baltasar Gracián was a leading didactic prose writer.

The Golden Age also produced many superb playwrights. Lope de Vega Carpio, one of the most prolific authors of all time, wrote a multitude of dramas, comedies, and religious plays. Tirso de Molina, Guillén de Castro y Bellvís, and Juan Ruiz de Alarcón were also outstanding playwrights. Calderón de la Barca was the last and probably the best dramatist of the epoch.

Also part of the Golden Age were the great Spanish mystics St. Theresa of Ávila, author of an inspired spiritual autobiography, and her disciple St. John of the Cross, one of Spain's finest lyric poets. Fray Luis Ponce de León wrote exquisite pastorals and Fernando de Herrera left stirring odes, but the most influential poet of the period was Luis de Góngora y Argote, whose precious, ornate verse was the most extreme expression of the baroque in Spanish literature; a cultivated, affected style known as Gongorism dominated Spanish letters in the latter half of the 17th cent.




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The Baroque
Main article: Spanish Baroque literature
See also: Spanish Golden Age#Literature

Cervantes's Don Quixote is considered the most emblematic work in the canon of Spanish literature and a founding classic of Western literatureIn the Baroque of the 17th century important topics are: the prose of Francisco de Quevedo and Baltasar Gracián; also the theater is remarkable (Lope de Vega, Pedro Calderon de la Barca, and Tirso de Molina), as well as the poetry with Luis de Góngora (who is a Culteranist) and Francisco de Quevedo (who is a Conceptist). In the works of Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra remarkable novels are: La Galatea, and Don Quixote de la Mancha. The Baroque style used exaggerated motion and clear, easily interpreted detail to produce drama, tension, exuberance, and grandeur in sculpture, painting, literature, dance, and music.

The Baroque is characterized by the following points:

Pessimism: The Renaissance did not obtain its purpose of imposing the harmony and the perfection in the world, just as the humanists intended, neither had done the man happier; the wars and the social inequalities continued to be present; the pain and the calamities were common in the whole Europe. An intellectual pessimism got installed, which accentuated as time passed; this shows united to the unangry character that the comedies of that epoch give testimony and the rascality in which the picaresque novels are based.
Disillusion: As the Renaissance ideals failed and in the case of Spain, the political power was being dispelled, the disillusion continues and arises in the literature, that in many cases recalls that of two centuries before, with the Dance of the Death or the Manrique's Couplets to the death of its father. Quevedo says that life is formed by "successions of deceased" : in them get converted the born, since the diapers to the mortise with the weak bodies are covered. In conclusion, nothing has importance, only one must obtain the eternal salvation.
Worry about the passing of time.
Loss of confidence in the Renaissance ideals