The Poetic Journey of Juan Ramón Jiménez
His Poetry
Juan Ramón Jiménez, though belonging to the second generation of his time, maintained close ties with the surrounding generations. He embraced modernism, influencing many avant-garde authors. He pursued truth and eternity through his work, believing that beauty is the key to achieving them. He viewed poetry as a source of knowledge, a way to capture the essence of things.
Jiménez’s poetry is pantheistic, accurate, and precise. His style evolved, marking two distinct periods in his work. The first period concluded in 1916, coinciding with the beginning of his second period. During a honeymoon trip to the United States, he wrote “Diary of a Newly Married Poet.” Love and the reality of things are recurring themes in his work. Another notable piece is “Madrigal Poems and Suffering,” a title highlighting Jiménez’s personal writing style, characterized by always writing “j” before “e” and “i.”
Jiménez consistently drew inspiration from his hometown, Moguer, which is reflected throughout his work.
Stages of His Work
The Sensitive Stage (1898-1915)
This stage is divided into two sub-stages: the first spanning until 1908, and the second until 1916. The initial sub-stage is marked by the influence of Bécquer, Symbolism, and subtle forms of Modernism, emphasizing rhyme, assonance, line art, and less intimate music. Landscape descriptions, reflecting the poet’s soul, dominate this period. These landscapes are not natural or inspired by travels like Machado’s, but rather confined to the statism of an indoor garden, an intimate order. Vague feelings of melancholy, music, faded colors, memories, and dreams of love prevail. It is an emotional and sentimental poetry where the poet’s sensibility shines through a perfect formal structure. Works from this stage include Rhymes (1902), Sad Arias (1903), Distant Gardens (1904), and Elegies (1907).
The second sub-stage is characterized by high art forms (hendecasyllables and Alexandrines), rhyme, and classical verse (sonnets, serventesios), showing a stronger Modernist influence from French Symbolism (Charles Baudelaire, Paul Verlaine) and Anglo-French decadence (Walter Pater). A recently discovered book written between 1910 and 1911, Book of Love, reveals a carnal and erotic poetry. The poet reaches Parnassian heights, particularly in the sonnets. Works from this sub-stage include La Soledad Sonora (1911), Theology (1911), Labyrinth (1913), Platero y yo (Andalusian Elegy) (1914), and Summer (1916), among others. Towards the end of this stage, the poet begins to feel weary of the sensory Modernism and becomes preoccupied with time and the possession of eternal beauty.
Platero and I, dated 1914, is the poet’s most popular work. Written in splendid prose, it gently guides the reader through a careful altarpiece of poetic images, introducing Platero: “Platero is small, furry, soft; so soft on the outside that one might think him made all of cotton, with no bones. Only the jet mirrors of his eyes are hard like two black glass beetles.” The narrative continues until Platero’s death and his ascension to heaven. In Moguer, the question lingers: “Platero, you see us, right?” following the letter of Juan Ramón Jiménez.
Summer (1916) marks the transition to Jiménez’s second stage. The poet departs from Modernism, seeking further refinement of the word. The nostalgic atmosphere of evoked dreams disappears, replaced by a more concrete reality.
The Intellectual Stage (1916-1936)
His first trip to America and contact with English poetry (Yeats, William Blake, Emily Dickinson, Shelley) deeply marked his second phase (1916-1936), which he termed the Intellectual Stage and linked to the literary movement of Novecentismo. A fundamental event occurs: the discovery of the sea as a transcendent force. The sea symbolizes life, loneliness, joy, and the eternal present. He also embarks on a spiritual evolution, seeking transcendence to overcome death. He strives for eternity, attainable only through poetic beauty and refinement. He eliminates musicality, poetic arguments, and external ornamentation, venturing into the deep, the pure, and the essential. Works from this period include Diary of a Newly Married Poet (1916), First Anthology of Poetry (1917), Eternity (1918), Stone and Sky (1919), Poetry (1917-23), and Beauty (1917-23).
Diary of a Newly Married Poet, later titled Journal of a Poet and the Sea (to include his wife’s middle name, Zenobia), marks the beginning of this new stage. It is a poetry without narrative, without the “robes of Modernism,” a stylized and refined poetry where the poet admires what he sees. This collection emerged from his trip to America. In the Diary, Jiménez experiments with themes and forms, opening a new poetic stream that would be explored by members of the Generation of ’27.
In Stone and Sky (1919), the central theme is poetic creation: poetry as an activity, the poem as an artistic object, and the poet as a god-creator of a new universe. This opens a new thematic line for Jiménez: the search for sublime poetry and the creative enhancement of pure, schematic poetry.
Total Station (1923-36) collects his last poems written in Spain. On August 22, 1936, Juan Ramón began his exile.
The Sufficient or True Stage (1937-1958)
This stage encompasses all works written during his American exile. Jiménez remained focused on his search for beauty and perfection, even preparing a comprehensive book for the Spanish Republic, War in Spain, which was never published. His yearning for transcendence led to a certain mysticism and identification with God and beauty. His poetic language became a kind of idiolect with multiple neologisms (ultratierra, desiring…). After a period of relative silence, he published Animal de Fondo (1949), Third Anthology of Poems (1957), On the Other Side (1936-42), and God Desired and Desiring (1948-49).
In Animal de Fondo, the poet seeks God “without rest or weariness.” This god is not external but resides within the poet and his work (“your heart is in me, as my way in the world is for you and I have created for you”). This god is the cause and end of beauty.
God Desired and Desiring (1948-49) is the culmination of Animal de Fondo. The poet identifies with the god he has sought, a god that exists both within and outside him, a god that is desired and desiring.
Juan Ramón Jiménez meticulously revised his work throughout his life. Space (1954) contains all the poetry he wished to be published.