Federico García Lorca: Life, Poetic Evolution, and Key Themes

Federico García Lorca (Fuente Vaqueros, Granada province, June 5, 1898 - Víznar, August 19, 1936) was a Spanish poet, playwright, and prose writer, also known for his skill in many arts. Assigned to the so-called Generation of '27, he is the most influential and popular poet of 20th-century Spanish literature. He was executed after the military uprising of the Spanish Civil War, due to his affinity with the Popular Front and for being openly homosexual.

Lorca's Poetic Evolution

Early Works and Modernist Touches

The first stage involves his production until 1927. Apart from the original Book of Poems (1921), which shows a touch of modernism, it includes First Songs (1922), Suites (1926), Songs (1927), some Odes, Gypsy Ballads (1928), and Poema del Cante Jondo (1931). These works feature a prevalent combination of traditional poetry with modern aesthetics.

Surrealist-Influenced Works

The second phase covers his surrealist-influenced works, notably Poet in New York (published posthumously in 1940).

Later Poems and Diverse Trends

In the third stage are the poems of his later years, which explore various trends: Diván del Tamarit (1940), Lament for Ignacio Sánchez Mejías (1935), Six Galician Poems (1935), and Sonnets of Dark Love, unpublished until 1984.

General Characteristics of Lorca's Work

Lorca's work, the result of extraordinary fantasy and imagination, draws from a broad literary tradition, which he revived and fused with elements of modernity.

Lorca's work is nourished by a rich Spanish literary tradition, including popular Arab-Andalusian poetry, classical works (Garcilaso, Góngora, Quevedo), Romanticism (Bécquer), and Modernism (Rubén Darío, Juan Ramón Jiménez).

Lorca incorporated avant-garde expressive themes and innovations, especially in his use of imagery.

Main Themes in Lorca's Poetry

Throughout García Lorca's poetic evolution, a consistent set of symbols, motifs, and themes recur and overlap:

• Love, both heterosexual and homosexual, is paramount in his work, appearing alongside desire, eroticism, and often condemned to pain and the loss of a loved one.
• Frustration and tragic fate, manifesting in various areas: lost childhood, impossible love, childless women, victims of capitalist society, and societal outcasts. This theme also relates to sterility in both women and and homosexual love.
• Death, a theme connected with love, frustration, and suffering, has a continuous presence.
• The marginalized and victims of power (economic and political), dehumanizing societal laws, and even the passion of love (e.g., persecuted Romani people, political dissidents, workers, and Black individuals) were topics of constant concern.