Baroque Literature: A Deep Dive into 17th-Century Spanish Poetry
Introduction
The Baroque cultural and artistic movement flourished throughout the 17th century, coinciding with a period of economic, political, and social decline in Spain. This decline was marked by widespread misery and depopulation due to epidemics, the expulsion of the Moors, and political mismanagement. The resulting crisis, caused by bankruptcy and the decreasing value of precious metals, deeply impacted the peasantry, who constituted the majority of the population. Disillusioned with humanism and vitalism, people turned towards religion.
Characteristics of Baroque Literature
Baroque literature is characterized by stark contrasts, exaggeration, a focus on the pleasures of life, and a simultaneous anxiety and resigned acceptance of life. Key themes include:
- Exaggeration and forced style
- Command of the gay life-sense
- Vitalism
- Anxious and resigned acceptance of life
Seventeenth-Century Lyric Poetry
Metaphysical, Moral, and Religious Poetry
Authors of this period explored metaphysical, moral, and religious themes in their poetry, reflecting their concerns and insights on disillusionment with life and the search for meaning.
Love Poetry
Love poetry was abundant, continuing the themes of courtly love and Petrarchanism, but with heightened tension. The concept of love was intertwined with the mentality of the time, with a notable Horatian influence.
Satire and Burlesque Poetry
Satirical poetry, rooted in moral critique, and burlesque poetry, with its conformist or parodic attitude, were also prominent.
Form and Metrics
Italian verse forms, combining hendecasyllables and Castilian verse, were common. Quatrains, octosyllable stanzas, letrillas, and romances were frequently used.
Expressive Resources
Baroque poetry employed a rich array of expressive resources, including metaphors, paradoxes, cultisms, hyperbole, and puns.
Quevedo
Thematic Issues
Quevedo’s work explored a wide range of themes, from metaphysical and religious subjects to moral satire.
Style
His style was characterized by the use of unusual metaphors, substantification, intensifiers, superlatives, wordplay, hyperbole, neologisms, antithesis, oxymoron, epithets, and paronomasia.
Works
- Metaphysical Poems: Primarily sonnets exploring the theme of tempus fugit (the fleeting nature of time).
- Moral Poems: Focused on virtues and stoicism.
- Religious Poems: Expressing Catholic faith, the futility of earthly life, preparation for death, and eternal life.
- Love Poems: Often linked to metaphysics, viewing love as a means of transcending life and overcoming death.
- Satirical Poems: Conveying bitterness and disappointment through linguistic games, targeting contemporary figures.
- Poems of Circumstance: Addressing past or present events.
Culteranismo
Culteranismo, spearheaded by Luis de Góngora, emphasized the use of cultismos (learned or obscure words). Key features include:
- Use of cultismos for expressiveness and musicality.
- Latinate syntax and complex lexicon.
- Colorful phrases, metaphors, alliteration, and hyperbaton.
Conceptismo
Conceptismo focused on witty and surprising associations of ideas and words. Key features include:
- Rationalist and logical lexicon, prioritizing intellectual meaning over emotion.
- Wordplay and derivation.
- Unexpected metaphors and antithesis.
Góngora
Characteristics
- Pictorial Sense: Descriptive and sensory language, emphasizing contemplation and imagery.
- Landscape: Nature as a central motif.
- Culteranismo and Populism: A blend of learned and popular elements.
- Satire and Eulogies: Both critical satire and praise of noble figures.
Style
- Cultismos: Latinate vocabulary.
- Hyperbaton: For flexibility and fluency.
- Mythological allusions and symbolism.
- Metaphor: Stylization of nature.
Works
: “Fable of Polyphemus and Galatea-lonely-panegyric to the Duke of Lerna-fable of Pyramus and Thisbe.