Understanding Romanticism, Realism, and Modernism in Literature

Romantic Literature: Characteristics

• Importance attached to freedom of originality and individualism.
• Projection of rebellion and escapism into nature.
• Nationalism.

Poetry Traits

• Use of topics such as love, loneliness, and passion.
• Rhetorical language.

Prose was used, especially in fiction and journalism.

Realist Literature: Characteristics

• Sentimental exaltation replaced by observation.
• Plausible reality is portrayed, and criticism is present.
• The novel is the most cultivated genre.

Realistic Novel Features

• Interest in reality and everyday life.
• Treatment of current issues with objectivity and realism.
• Critical presence of the omniscient narrator.

Realism and Naturalism in Spain

• Prereality: Began in 1849 with Fernán Caballero, characterized by a moralizing tone and purpose.
• Realism of Manners: Began in 1870 with Benito Pérez Galdós, featuring a realistic, objective, and critical narrator.
• Naturalism: 1881, Galdós's The Disinherited, recreates sordid aspects of existence.

Modernism: Features

• Search for beauty and rhythm.
• Escapism from reality.
• Emergence of themes revolving around melancholy, weariness, and negligence.
• Symbolic elements employed.

Textual Communication

A complete message is transmitted orally or in writing in an act of communication.

Characteristics

• The message appears as a closed linguistic universe.
• Shows a thematic unit.
• Has internal cohesion.

Adequacy

Text is appropriate to the choices made by the issuer from among the possibilities that language offers.

Adequacy Factors

• Recipient addresses the text and the relationship between the sender and the receiver.
• Occurs in the text means by transmitting the message (oral or written).

Consistency

Has three thematically linked requirements:

1. The ideas of the text must be related to the topic.
2. The ideas of a text must be consistent with the context.
3. Introduces the principle of non-contradiction; any idea of a text must be compatible with the others.

Cohesion

Is the relationship of lexical and grammatical sentences of a text.

Correction

Is based on respect for the rules affecting the lexicon, linguistics, grammar, and spelling.