Federico García Lorca: Life and Literary Legacy

FGL: Fuentevaqueros in 1898

Studied law, philosophy, and music. In 1919, he moved to Madrid, establishing relationships with prominent writers, poets, and artists of his generation. He was a NY Fellow in 1929-30.

In 1932, he founded La Barraca, a university theater company that brought classic and contemporary plays to the pueblos. He was assassinated in 1936.

Double-edged personality: Overwhelming charisma and vitality juxtaposed with intimate discomfort and the pain of living.

Poetics

• His attitude is very strict.
• Poetry where passion and perfection, the human and the aesthetic, coexist in a rare purity.
• Popular and cultured elements are intertwined.

Literary Works

First Book: Book of Poems (1921)

• Influenced by Bécquer and Machado, modernism.
• Themes: childhood nostalgia, youthful songs.

1921-1924 Crisis (Extremely heterogeneous works)

• Nostalgia for his childhood, tragic themes.
• Cante Jondo Poem (a compact unit, a book full of death, expressing his grief of living).

Gypsy Ballads (1928)

• Achieved great success.
• Focuses on the marginalized and persecuted Romani people, elevating them to a modern myth.
• Themes: tragic destiny, frustrated characters, death.

Poet in New York

• Inspired by his contact with the violent commotion of New York City, the power of money, and human enslavement by machines.
• One part is dedicated to Black people, with poems that are cries of pain and violent protest.
• Features wide verse and imagery to build illogical, apocalyptic visions, renewing his language.

Theater

• Deep thematic content.
• Scenes depicting tragic fates (ordered, sterile life).
• Characters are placed on intersecting metaphysical and social planes.

Theatrical Conceptions

• Preferred activity in his last six years, starting with La Barraca in 1932.
• Idea of didactic theater (arts and education).
• Social or popular approach.

Language

• A variety of genres.
• Clear speech, drawing from lore and poetic language.
• Incorporates popular and simple forms, as well as elements from Greek tragedy and Shakespeare.

Early Plays

• The Butterfly's Evil Spell (1920)
• Punch and Judy Puppets (1922-23)
• The Shoemaker's Prodigious Wife (1926)

Experimental Plays

• The Public and As Five Years Pass (1931)

Mature Plays

Women occupy a central place.

• Blood Wedding (1933): A bride escapes on her wedding night with her lover, framed by hatred and family revenge.
• Yerma (1934): A drama about female infertility and dissatisfaction with a husband's fidelity.
• Doña Rosita the Spinster (1935): Depicts the situation of women in the urban bourgeoisie.
• The House of Bernarda Alba (1936): Explores issues of authority and freedom. The second day after her husband's funeral, Bernarda announces an eight-year mourning period for her daughters. The play revolves around anxieties, Pepe el Romano (representing money), and the envy and rivalry among the sisters. Adela and Pepe's affair is discovered, leading to a tragic climax with Adela's suicide after being shot by Bernarda.