Defining Romanticism: Characteristics and Spanish Literary Forms
Concept and Characteristics of Romanticism
Romanticism is an ideological, literary, and artistic movement, fundamentally defined by an attitude toward life marked by the desire for freedom.
Vital Freedom and Conflict
The Romantic spirit is characterized by conflict: conflict with the self, with the world, and with destiny.
- The irrational spirit breaks the boundaries of the rational and the real. However, the limitations and disappointments of life often create an uneasiness that can lead to suicide.
- The conflict with the world drives the Romantic to rebel, leading to a preference for outcasts and marginalized figures (e.g., beggars).
- The Romantic hero, often yielding in their struggle against fate, is sometimes identified with Satanism (as seen in Espronceda’s El estudiante de Salamanca) or the Titanic archetype.
The struggle against the limits of the self leads to two primary positions:
- Action: The effort to change the world (e.g., Lord Byron, Espronceda).
- Avoidance: Seeking refuge in space (sensual, exotic, unreal settings), time (the Middle Ages, the Golden Age), or the journey of no return (to worlds beyond the grave, literary or actual suicide, or refuge in religious mysticism).
Aesthetic Freedom
Romanticism fundamentally rejects classical rules and norms:
- Rejection of Rules: Romantics mix prose and verse, juxtapose canonical beauty with terrible beauty, the serious with the grotesque, the grand with the intimate, and the epic with the banal. They utilize both elevated and vulgar language.
- Search for Originality: A strong emphasis is placed on unique expression.
- Rhetorical Excess: Romantic expression often tends toward excess, utilizing rhetorical flourishes. This includes a dominant lexicon of values, expressive punctuation marks, and archaisms. Romantics sought a new symbolic language to express the ineffable.
The Romantic Feeling of Nature
Nature adapts to the mood of the individual (pathetic fallacy). Romantics prefer wild settings such as cemeteries, high mountains, mysterious forests, and storms. The atmosphere is predominantly nocturnal, favoring the supernatural and the macabre.
Nationalism and Historical Appreciation
Romantics sought national identity and difference through language, authentic national history, and traditions (often reflected literally in customs, known as costumbrismo). This focus fueled regional movements such as the Renaixença in Catalonia and the Rexurdimento in Galicia.
Romantic Prose Forms
The Romantic Novel
The novel experienced tremendous growth during the Romantic period. The preferred form was the historical novel, featuring historical and legendary subjects, often set in the Middle Ages. Notable examples include:
- El Señor de Bembibre (1844) by Enrique Gil y Carrasco.
- El doncel de Don Enrique el Doliente (1834) by Mariano José de Larra.
- Sancho Saldaña (1834) by José de Espronceda.
Costumbrismo: Sketches of Manners
Costumbrismo (sketches of manners) consists of satirical narrative pieces that reflect daily life, focusing on genuine, indigenous, pure, and traditional aspects of society (popular types, customs, lifestyles, and social defects). Key works include:
- Escenas Matritenses (Madrid Scenes) by Ramón de Mesonero Romanos.
- Escenas Andaluzas (Andalusian Scenes) by Serafín Estébanez Calderón.
Mariano José de Larra: Critical Journalism
Mariano José de Larra represents the pinnacle of critical costumbrismo. He published over two hundred articles under various pseudonyms, notably in publications like El Duende Satírico del Día and El Pobrecito Hablador. His articles are typically grouped into the following categories:
- Political Articles: Arguments against absolutism and Carlism.
- Literary Articles: Critiques of the literature of his time.
- Customs Articles: Selections highlighting the defects of Spanish society, such as backward customs, sloth, and bureaucracy.
Among his most famous pieces are Casarse pronto y mal, El Castellano Viejo, Vuelva usted mañana, and Día de Difuntos de 1836. Most of his work was published in newspapers and magazines, reflecting the development of journalism during the nineteenth century. Larra also published several novels in serial form.