Spanish Lyric Poetry: Silver Age Movements (1900-1939)
Twentieth-Century Spanish Lyric Poetry (1900-1939)
This period, known as the Silver Age due to the extraordinary surge in Hispanic culture, includes the following movements and authors:
- Modernism (approx. 1880-1914)
- Poetry of Unamuno and Antonio Machado (Generation of ’98)
- Poetry of Juan Ramón Jiménez (Novecentismo / Generation of ’14)
- The Avant-garde movements
- The Generation of ’27
- Poetry of Miguel Hernández
The year 1939 marks the end of the Spanish Civil War and, in many cases, the continuity of poetry in exile.
Modernism
Modernism was a movement introduced in Spain by the Nicaraguan Rubén Darío, who initially influenced Juan Ramón Jiménez and Antonio Machado. It drew upon French influences, introducing the escapist aesthetic of “art for art’s sake” (as opposed to the dominant utilitarianism of the bourgeois order). It provided a language full of new rhythms, dazzling sensory effects, and musicality, also rich in symbols and mythical allusions. Its intimate, romantic inspiration expressed moods (such as sadness, boredom, or existential ennui) often associated with autumn and sunset landscapes, melancholic sunsets, ancient palaces in exotic places, and lonely gardens. Key Modernist figures include:
- Rubén Darío (the great master of the movement)
- Salvador Rueda
- Francisco Villaespesa
- Manuel Machado (brother of Antonio)
Noventayochistas: Unamuno and Machado
The poetry of Unamuno and Antonio Machado shows a deeper concern for the depth of ideas and feelings. Both explored typical existential and religious issues in their poems (the latter being most evident in Unamuno). As Noventayochista authors, they interpreted the Castilian landscape, relating it to Spain’s decline and the need for regeneration. Their poetry includes all types of reflections, products of their personal experiences and the poet’s inner dialogue with himself and his time, in search of what A. Machado called the “universal sentiment.” This sentiment is present in themes of love, death, time, God, and reality. Common features include a philosophical inclination, the use of shared symbols, and a low profile given to poetic ornament or pure sound. The poetry of A. Machado (notably Soledades, Galerías y Otros Poemas, Campos de Castilla, and Nuevas Canciones) has moved generations with its depth, authenticity, and ideological loyalty.
Juan Ramón Jiménez: Novecentismo & Pure Poetry
For Juan Ramón Jiménez, poetry was not merely a search for beauty, but a means to achieve wholeness, eternity, and knowledge. The poet himself distinguished three periods in his work:
- The Sensitive Period (until 1915): Marked by Bécquerian and Modernist influences, including works like Sad Gardens and Distant Arias.
- The Intellectual or ‘Nude’ Period (1916-1936): Beginning with Diario de un poeta recién casado, where the poet aimed to remove anything non-essential.
- The Final or ‘Sufficiency’ Period (1936 until his death): Showing the author’s obsession to achieve transcendence and eternity through his work, such as Animal de fondo and Dios deseado y deseante.
Subjected to a progressive purification of ornamental elements and obsessive perfectionism, his poetry became increasingly abstract, mystical, and secretive, often tending towards poetic prose. This attempt to reach a pure art, free of any narrative or sentiment, places JRJ within Novecentismo or the Generation of ’14. His influence, both in his time and for later generations, has been enormous. He received the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1956.
Avant-Garde & Generation of ’27 Poetry
The desire to experiment and dramatically renew poetic language was evident in Europe during the first third of the twentieth century’s art movements: Futurism, Cubism, Expressionism, Dadaism, and Surrealism. In Spain, these ‘isms’ arrived mainly through the works of Ramón Gómez de la Serna and took on Hispanic forms in Creationism and Ultraism, greatly influencing the Generation of ’27. This group of poets, commemorating the tercentenary of Góngora’s death in 1927, consisted of:
- Pedro Salinas
- Jorge Guillén
- Federico García Lorca
- Rafael Alberti
- Vicente Aleixandre
- Luis Cernuda
- Gerardo Diego
- Dámaso Alonso
- Emilio Prados
- Manuel Altolaguirre
Among their extraordinary contributions, we highlight the synthesis between the best of Spanish poetic tradition and new avant-garde languages (especially Surrealism), and their evolution from a ‘pure poetry’ (the poem as an autonomous entity unrelated to life) towards a ‘rehumanized’ poetry.