Spanish Modernist literature is the

literature Literature is any collection of written work, but it is also used more narrowly for writings specifically considered to be an art form, especially prose fiction, drama, and poetry. In recent centuries, the definition has expanded to include ...

Spain , image_flag = Bandera de España.svg , image_coat = Escudo de España (mazonado).svg , national_motto = ''Plus ultra'' (Latin)(English: "Further Beyond") , national_anthem = (English: "Royal March") , i ...

written during the

Modernism Modernism is both a philosophy, philosophical and arts movement that arose from broad transformations in Western world, Western society during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The movement reflected a desire for the creation of new fo ...

(beginning of the 20th century) as the arts evolved and opposed the previous

Realism Realism, Realistic, or Realists may refer to: In the arts *Realism (arts), the general attempt to depict subjects truthfully in different forms of the arts Arts movements related to realism include: *Classical Realism *Literary realism, a move ...

Parnasianism and Symbolism

The influence of these two movements, which were developed in France from the middle of the 19th century, was very important to the appearance of Modernism in Spain. *

Parnasianism Parnassianism (or Parnassism) was a French literary style that began during the positivist period of the 19th century, occurring after romanticism and prior to symbolism. The style was influenced by the author Théophile Gautier as well as by th ...

, named after its first appearance in the magazine "Le Parnasse Contemporain" (1866–1876), is a literary style that postulates art for art's sake, far from the important and sentimental ambitions that

Romanticism Romanticism (also known as the Romantic movement or Romantic era) was an artistic, literary, musical, and intellectual movement that originated in Europe towards the end of the 18th century, and in most areas was at its peak in the approximate ...

defended. Those in favor tried to create "beautiful objects", approaching exotic subjects and ornamenting them with a musical language, but which are cold. The father of this school was

Leconte de Lisle Charles Marie René Leconte de Lisle (; 22 October 1818 – 17 July 1894) was a French poet of the Parnassian movement. He is traditionally known by his surname only, Leconte de Lisle''. Biography Leconte de Lisle was born on the French overseas ...

. *

Symbolism Symbolism or symbolist may refer to: Arts * Symbolism (arts), a 19th-century movement rejecting Realism ** Symbolist movement in Romania, symbolist literature and visual arts in Romania during the late 19th and early 20th centuries ** Russian sy ...

, however, has a transcendental ambition. The main figure of the movement is

Charles Baudelaire Charles Pierre Baudelaire (, ; ; 9 April 1821 – 31 August 1867) was a French poetry, French poet who also produced notable work as an essayist and art critic. His poems exhibit mastery in the handling of rhyme and rhythm, contain an exoticis ...

. For the author of ''The flowers of evil'', all the universe, spiritual, and terrestrial, forms a harmonious set, united to each other by invisible correspondences, and the personality of the poet is the one in charge of revealing them. This way, for example, a sun hiding could be seen by the writer as a decay symbol, while a sunrise would symbolize the Renaissance. This assumption suggests comparisons to the poet, but fundamentally metaphors.

Literary Modernism in Spain: context

In Literature, the precursor of Modernism in Spain was

The disaster of the 98

The Spanish–American War, known in Spain as the Disaster of the 98 or War of Cuba, arose between Spain and the United States in 1898, during the regency of María Cristina, widow of the king

Alfonso XII Alfonso XII (Alfonso Francisco de Asís Fernando Pío Juan María de la Concepción Gregorio Pelayo; 28 November 185725 November 1885), also known as El Pacificador or the Peacemaker, was King of Spain from 29 December 1874 to his death in 188 ...

. For Spain it meant the loss of the overseas colonies and the end of the formerly powerful Spanish empire.

The Regenerationism

The intellectual movement that thinks objectively and scientifically about the causes of the decadence of Spain as a nation between the 19th and the 20th century is called Regenerationism. It expresses a pessimist judgement about Spain. The regenerationist intellectuals divulgated their studies in journals with a big diffusion, so the movement expanded.

The Free Institution of Education

Among the organisms of great importance at this time, it is possible to emphasize the Free Institution of Education, founded in Madrid in 1876 by the university professor and thinker

Francisco Giner de los Ríos Francisco Giner de los Ríos (10 October 1839 in Ronda, Spain – 18 February 1915 in Madrid) was a philosopher, educator and one of the most influential Spanish intellectuals at the end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th century. Biog ...

. With philosophical ideas of German origin, he undertook a hard work of cultural modernization of Spain, in education and investigation. His pro-European character was very influential during the 20th century, particularly during the Second Republic, that welcomed his reformist ideals willingly. In 1939 the Institution disappeared, strongly repressed by the winners of the

Civil War A civil war or intrastate war is a war between organized groups within the same state (or country). The aim of one side may be to take control of the country or a region, to achieve independence for a region, or to change government policies ...

. Whatsoever, a decidedly modern thought was spread mainly between the bourgeoisie, class which will display the most important authors of the 20th century.

Characteristics

Modernism, studied as a literary or as an artistic-literary movement, appeared in the Hispanic world in the final decades of the 19th century and the first ones of the 20th century. It is seen today as a phenomenon with much more vast projections in space and time. A period of renovation in America and Europe was opened, which started from a common will of rejection towards the dogmas and principles of the society. The Modernist period or time begins and closes in dates that could be fixed towards 1880 and 1945, although precursory signs occurred before the first and they continued being observed after the last. In the politics, the forms of the modernist disobedience are reflected in a sentimental rather than intellectual inclination, towards the liberating creeds, socialism and anarchism. In their youth, people like

Miguel de Unamuno Miguel de Unamuno y Jugo (29 September 1864 – 31 December 1936) was a Spanish essayist, novelist, poet, playwright, philosopher, professor of Greek and Classics, and later rector at the University of Salamanca. His major philosophical essay w ...

and

Leopoldo Lugones Leopoldo Antonio Lugones Argüello (13 June 1874 – 18 February 1938) was an Argentine poet, essayist, novelist, playwright, historian, professor, translator, biographer, philologist, theologian, diplomat, politician and journalist. His poetic ...

were attracted to socialism, whereas the anarchist doctrine seemed at first to attract

Pío Baroja Pío Baroja y Nessi (28 December 1872 – 30 October 1956) was a Spanish writer, one of the key novelists of the Generation of '98. He was a member of an illustrious family. His brother Ricardo was a painter, writer and engraver, and his nephew ...

and

Manuel González Prada Jose Manuel de los Reyes González de Prada y Ulloa (Lima, January 5, 1844 – Lima, July 22, 1918) was a Peruvian politician and anarchist, literary critic and director of the National Library of Peru. He is well remembered as a social criti ...

. The aversion to the society that surrounded them (and not only, although of course also, the governments) urged them to look for inhabitable worlds, often invented. The indigenism and the exotism are the two slopes of the protest against the predominant meanness. The escapism and the denunciation of the bourgeois society are complementary aspects of an ambivalent attitude. The plastic writers and artists agreed in the negation, and even an officially conservative man like

Antonio Gaudí Antonio is a masculine given name of Etruscan origin deriving from the root name Antonius. It is a common name among Romance language-speaking populations as well as the Balkans and Lusophone Africa. It has been among the top 400 most popular male ...

projected in unusual architectures his escapist deliriums (arabicism of the Vicens House, in Barcelona, or purified gothicism of the Episcopal Palace of Astorga). Indigenism and exotism were not negative attitudes: they implied the affirmation of the inhabitable world; even more, of myths in which close truths of universal validity were declared. The Modernist authors were simultaneously positivists, by hostility to the established conventions, and antipositivists, by reaction against a system in which the spiritual tendencies did not have place. Trying to affiliate them with a philosophy is so impossible and absurd as trying to affiliate them with a party. From

Plato Plato ( ; grc-gre, Πλάτων ; 428/427 or 424/423 – 348/347 BC) was a Greek philosopher born in Athens during the Classical period in Ancient Greece. He founded the Platonist school of thought and the Academy, the first institution ...

and

Pythagoras Pythagoras of Samos ( grc, Πυθαγόρας ὁ Σάμιος, Pythagóras ho Sámios, Pythagoras the Samos, Samian, or simply ; in Ionian Greek; ) was an ancient Ionians, Ionian Ancient Greek philosophy, Greek philosopher and the eponymou ...

, mainly from this last one, or the doctrines that are protected under their name, the rhythmical conception of the universe and the life arrived to the Modernists, and it became the axis of their poetic creation. The Pythagorism of the Modernists comprises an inclination to the esoteric doctrines, shown in their interest for the hidden things and in a desire or restlessness for communicating with the afterlife, expressed already in 1895 by one of its eminent precursors:

Gérard de Nerval Gérard de Nerval (; 22 May 1808 – 26 January 1855) was the pen name of the French writer, poet, and translator Gérard Labrunie, a major figure of French romanticism, best known for his novellas and poems, especially the collection ''Les Fil ...

. The so-called ''declining Literature'' familiarized them with the occultism, and

Rubén Darío Félix Rubén García Sarmiento (January 18, 1867 – February 6, 1916), known as Rubén Darío ( , ), was a Nicaraguan poet who initiated the Spanish-language literary movement known as ''modernismo'' (modernism) that flourished at the end of ...

Ramón del Valle-Inclán Ramón María del Valle-Inclán y de la Peña (in Vilanova de Arousa, Galicia, Spain, 28 October 1866 – Santiago de Compostela, 5 January 1936) was a Spanish dramatist, novelist and member of the Spanish Generation of 98. He is considered pe ...

Horacio Quiroga Horacio Silvestre Quiroga Forteza (31 December 1878 – 19 February 1937) was a Uruguayan playwright, poet, and short story writer. He wrote stories which, in their jungle settings, used the supernatural and the bizarre to show the struggle of ...

, among others, wrote narrations in which the action of the strange forces is described. Valle-Inclán wrote up in ''La lámpara maravillosa (The wonderful lamp)'' a treaty of esoteric aesthetic. These restlessness logically derived to interest in spiritism. Even if nonbelieving in it, some Modernist authors really interrogated themselves about the part that could be right in those doctrines, and got initiated in their mysteries. In diverse forms these mysteries infiltrated in their works. Also the mysticism of the Modernists is interesting, orthodox or heterodox, but rarely free of eroticism, associated to the erotic impulse of giving oneself to the other, to surrender. The end point of the eroticism and the mysticism is the ecstasy. The eroticism approaches other times the violence and the blood, like with Valle-Inclán and

Rodríguez Larreta Rodriguez ( in Peninsular Spain or in Latin America) is a Hispanic surname meaning "son of Rodrigo". It is often rendered without the accent mark, primarily outside Spanish-speaking countries. It may refer to: __NOTOC__ People * Rodríguez (surn ...

; ''The glory of Don Ramiro'' is perhaps the most extreme culmination of such associations, that in poetry were registered in unforgettable verses of

. Other poets (such as Palés Matos and

Juan Ramón Jiménez Juan Ramón Jiménez Mantecón (; 23 December 1881 – 29 May 1958) was a Spanish poet, a prolific writer who received the 1956 Nobel Prize in Literature "for his lyrical poetry, which in the Spanish language constitutes an example of high ...

) would later raise the erotic to the point of the metaphysic. The Modernists were parnasianists, that is, in favor of the impeccable form, of the beauty called to last by the perfection whereupon it was expressed; and symbolists, that revealed the unknown by the well-known, the indescribable in figures adapted to express it. The Modernism is associated to the parnasianism with sculpture; to the symbolism with music. It does not have to be understood that between the one and other there is an unsalvable border; on the contrary, if in some modernist writers, like

José Santos Chocano José Santos Chocano Gastañodi (May 14, 1875 – December 13, 1934), more commonly known by his pseudonym "El Cantor de América" (), was a Peruvian poet, writer and diplomat, whose work was widely praised across Europe and Latin America. Conside ...

and

Guillermo Valencia Guillermo Valencia Castillo (October 29, 1873 in Popayán, Colombia – July 8, 1943 in Popayán) was a Colombian poet, translator, and politician. Valencia was a pioneer of Modernism in Colombia and a member of the Colombian Conservative Pa ...

, the cult to the form predominates, in others, like

and

Antonio Machado Antonio Cipriano José María y Francisco de Santa Ana Machado y Ruiz (26 July 1875 – 22 February 1939), known as Antonio Machado, was a Spanish poet and one of the leading figures of the Spanish literary movement known as the Generation ...

, a preference for the intimism can be seen. And still it must be remembered that the symbolism of which it is spoken is not only consequence of the French symbolism of the Eighties; even if coming from there in the initial impulse, and although the vocabulary and the subject matter of the Modernists was impregnated by those of the French symbolists, the Spanish Modernists did not take much time in assimilating also the symbolism of the poets of English language, and still the one of San Juan the de la Cruz as well. It cannot surprise that in the general current of Modernism diverse tendencies come together, some times complementary, some times contradictory, because thus it has to be, fundamentally, any historical period, be the Renaissance, the Romanticism, or the Modernism. And those diversities and antagonisms occur ''inside'' men, and not only ''between'' men. Divided, in struggle with the others and with themselves, denying with the reason what the feeling postulates, the top figures of the Modernism, who better represented it (

) lived in anguish, if not in desperation. These two feelings, much more than the swans and the princesses, mere occasional ornamentation, constitute the most arduous legacy of the Modernists to their heirs and successors.

Some authors

Miguel de Unamuno

Miguel de Unamuno (1864–1936) was an essayist, novelist, poet, playwright and philosopher from Spain. In his works he cultivated a great variety of literary genres.

Rubén Darío

Félix Rubén García Sarmiento (1867–1916) was a Nicaraguan poet who wrote under the pseudonym of Rubén Darío. His poetry brought vigor to the stale, monotonous Spanish-language poetry of the time.

Bibliography

* ''Modernismo (Literatura)'', Enciclopedia Salvat Universal, Salvat Editores, {{ISBN, 84-345-9500-1. * Silva, José Asunción, Obra completa, Madrid: Ediciones de Centenario. Allca xx,

Silva Poetry House The Silva Poetry House is a Colombian historical cultural organization located in the Candelaria neighborhood of Bogotá. It was founded on May 24, 1986 by Belisario Betancur, in the house where the Colombian poet José Asunción Silva used to li ...

, 1996.