Literary Movements and Key Authors in Extremadura (Post-War to Present)

Post-War Extremaduran Literature (1940s–1960s)

Álvarez Lencero underlines his commitment to the disadvantaged with markedly lyrical and somewhat transcendent verses.

In this post-conflict period, we must also mention a poet of national importance who developed his work away from Extremadura: José María Valverde (1926–1996). Although difficult to classify, some relate him to the Catholic poets of the Generation of '36 (Rosales, Panero, Vivanco), not only for his sincere religious attitude, apparent in Man and God (1945), but also for his peaceful lyrical nature.

Contemporary Spanish Theater: Manuel Martínez Mediero

The last years of the dictatorship coincided with the writing and premiere of plays by an author recognized as a key figure in the history of contemporary Spanish theater: Manuel Martínez Mediero (Badajoz, 1939).

His works, related to alternative and avant-garde theater movements, used social and political criticism, arousing great controversy at the end of the dictatorship and during the democratic transition. Among his important works, we can cite:

• Sisters of Buffalo Bill
• The Furious Baby

End of the Transition and Post-War Streams (1970s–1980s)

Two streams predominated in Extremadura during the seventies: social realism and experimentalism.

Social Realism and Experimentalism

Examples of these trends include:

• The novelist José Antonio Gabriel y Galán (1940–1993), whose style is related to the realism of the fifties.
• The novelist and playwright Jesús Alviz (1946–1998). In his novels, such as I Have Loved Wagner, he makes experimental and risky bets, focusing on the raw individual rather than the group or society.

Theater of the Early Eighties

In the early eighties, the theater of Miguel Murillo (b. 1953) appeared, participating in this critique of everyday social reality in works such as The Pew, and with a strong poetic touch in Perfume of Mimosas.

The Latest Generations of Extremaduran Authors

This period, which is still open, is defined by the appearance of new names rather than radically different aesthetic proposals. We have examples in two highly successful authors:

1. Javier Cercas (b. 1962): His novel Soldiers of Salamis utilized the confusion of genres (novel, journalism, essay).
2. The priest Jesús Sánchez Adalid (b. 1962): He represents Extremadura's success in the national historical novel genre with works such as The Mozarabic.