Notes, summaries, assignments, exams, and problems for Latin

Modernism

Beginning in the late 19th century in Hispanic America, with creators like José Martí and Rubén Darío. It began with the publication of Azul by Ruben Dario. Key features include:

• A focus on aesthetic literature, seeking beauty.
• A search for escape from reality, often through remote settings.
• Themes expressing feelings like weariness (existential anxiety), apathy (living without desire), and melancholy (sadness).
• Use of symbolic elements, such as the swan as a symbol of modern beauty.

Generation of '98

A group of authors born between 1864 and 1875, with two main themes: a decadent Spain and existential angst. Prominent authors include: Miguel de Unamuno, Pío Baroja, Azorín, Ramón Valle-Inclán, and Ramiro de Maeztu. Their thoughts... Continue reading "Modernism and Generation of '98: Key Authors and Themes" »

The Origins of Popular Lyric Poetry

Lyric poetry originated in the everyday activities of people singing. The main theme was love, and the songs were oral and anonymous.

The Jarchas: Mozarabic Lyric

The jarchas were popular Mozarabic lyric ditties of no more than 5 or 6 lines. They gather laments of a girl in love and are very expressive with direct language. Characteristic personalities include the habib (beloved), the mamma (mother), and the yermanelas (sisters).

Catalan Lyric

• Influenced by the poetry of the Provençal troubadours, sometimes written in Provençal.
• Composed by the troubadours.
• Main theme: courtly love.
• Genres: The canso, the sirventes, and the tenso.

Galician-Portuguese Lyric

• Influenced by the Provençal.
• Appeared at the end of the 12th

Lope de Vega: His Literary Legacy

Lope de Vega cultivated most of the literary genres of his time. He was an excellent lyric and epic poet, and he wrote several prose works.

Prose Works

• Arcadia: A pastoral novel with Renaissance idealism.
• The Shepherds of Bethlehem: A religious work that is pessimistic about the world.
• The Pilgrim in His Homeland: An adventure novel.
• Novelas a Marcia Leonarda: Four Italian-style short stories, dedicated to his last wife, Marta de Nevares-Marcia Leonarda.

Most notably, the prose work La Dorotea is an extensive dialogue work. For many, it is his masterpiece, a text that should be considered alongside other compositions from the final stretch of the writer's life, which convey bitterness, disappointment, and melancholy.... Continue reading "Lope de Vega's Literary Legacy: Prose, Drama, and Poetic Innovations" »

Modernism in Latin America

Modernism had its source in Latin America at the end of the 19th century. José Martí (Cuba) and Rubén Darío (Nicaragua) created and distributed it. "Azul" by Rubén Darío is considered the start of Modernism.

Features of Modernism

• Aesthetic Literature: It seeks beauty above all else, emphasizing rhythm and musicality while changing metrical forms.
• Topics: Feelings such as boredom, apathy, and melancholy are explored. This causes authors to take refuge in dream worlds.
• Escapism: An escape from reality, situating works in remote venues, both in space and time. They discuss alien civilizations, the past, and luxurious surroundings.
• Symbolic Elements: The swan is a symbol of Modernist aesthetics.
• Erotic, Poetic Language

Modern Spanish Poetry: Key Poets

Considered a pioneer of modernism, Rubén Darío was responsible for its dissemination in Spain, alongside poets such as Salvador Rueda, Antonio Machado, Juan Ramón Jiménez, Eduardo Marquina, and Manuel Machado. Their poetry acquired an intimate tone.

Rubén Darío

Rubén Darío was the creator and promoter of Modernism. His first book, Azul (Blue), was a mixture of verse and prose. With Prosas Profanas (Profane Prose), he established the model for modernist poetry, intimidating his supporters. These books also addressed universal human problems: political poems, existential anxieties, and irony.

Antonio Machado

Antonio Machado's poetry is characterized by its depth in topics such as intimacy, memories, the Castilian... Continue reading "Modern Spanish Poetry: Key Poets and Vanguard Movements" »

Introduction

During the Civil War, theater served as a means of political propaganda, exemplified by the Theater of the Falange and guerrilla theater. The post-war situation was catastrophic: authors like Valle-Inclán, Lorca, Muñoz Seca, Antonio Machado, and Unamuno perished; others, including Alberti, Casona, and Max Aub, went into exile; and those who remained in Spain (J. Álvarez Quintero, Arniches, Benavente, Manuel Machado, and Eduardo Marquina) saw limited premieres or ceased writing. Notably, exiled author Max Aub published San Juan in 1942, depicting a ship carrying Jewish refugees fleeing the Nazis, denied port entry. Alejandro Casona premiered "La dama del alba" in Buenos Aires (1944).

1. Theater of Consumption

1.1. The Fifties: "

Baroque in 17th-Century Valencian Literature

Baroque is the period of Western culture that began in the 17th century. It was a very prolific period in all forms of artistic manifestation, in which there was always an attitude of disappointment.

Key Themes of the Baroque Period

• Transience of life
• The taste for the monstrous
• The passage of time
• Contrasts

Literary Devices in Baroque Literature

• Taste for ornamentation (hyperbole and hyperbaton)
• Confusion between reality and appearance (paradoxes, antitheses, and puns)

Literary Currents of the Baroque

• Conceptismo: Showcases sharpness of wit through the association of ideas and words.
• Culteranismo: Focuses on formal beauty, with a heavy and pompous style.

Prose in 17th-Century Valencian Literature

Authors:

1. Pere

In the first decades of the 20th century, a new narrative emerged in Spanish literature, influenced by modern trends and the Generation of '98. This period was characterized by a firm rejection of the 19th-century realist novel.

Modernism and the Generation of '98

Modernism reflected a cult of the sensory and plastic images, emphasizing linguistic and sensual musicality. The Generation of '98, on the other hand, adopted a regenerationist attitude towards Spain's problems, its history, and the national question.

Miguel de Unamuno: The Intellectual and Existential Novel

Miguel de Unamuno stands out in this era for his intellectual and existential novels. His works reflected his philosophical vision of the world. He famously coined the term "Nivola"... Continue reading "Spanish Novel's Evolution: Modernism, '98, and Avant-Garde Literary Movements" »

Nouveau Features

The creator, far from everyday reality, invents an aristocratic art, elegant and exotic. The environments evoke classical antiquity, with a medieval atmosphere in Paris. There is a cult of the beauty of form, collecting a wealth of themes ranging from classical to modern, symbolist attitudes, vision, and interpretation of reality. Poetic trends in modern poetry are an explosion where colors, sounds, and sensual aromas, etc., are an extreme idealization.

Generation of '98 - Features

A vision of Spain and Castile is absorbed, focusing on the authentically Spanish through landscape, history, and literature. Idealistic solutions are proposed to regenerate the country, a mixture of romantic and subjective attitudes with existentialism,... Continue reading "Spanish Literature: Key Movements, Authors, and Works" »

Impersonality in the Spanish Language

Syntactic Impersonality

• Natural phenomena and weather verbs
• Verbs do and have
• Have to + infinitive
• Attributive or pseudo-copulative verbs with "se" or reflexive

Semantic Impersonality

• Ignorance of the agent by the issuer
• Intention to hide the agent
• Agent indeterminacy
• Second passive (subject + be + past participle)
• Reflexive passive (be + verb + subject in agreement)
• Constructions in the 3rd person plural
• Constructions in the 2nd person plural
• Constructions in the 2nd person singular with one
• Use of the plurality of humility

Regional Variations in the Spanish Language

Northern Varieties

• Distinction of sounds "s" and "z"
• Unaspirated pronunciation of "s" at the end of a syllable
• Leísmo, laísmo, loísmo
• Asturias: Closure of