15th-Century Spanish Literature: Poetry and Prose
B) Educated Lyric Poetry
In the fifteenth century, nobles increased their power and became patrons of the arts and literature. This created a cultural environment where poetry flourished. Around the king and the great literary masters emerged courts, which anticipated the Renaissance ideal of the perfect gentleman, skilled in both arms and letters.
The work of many of these authors was widely known and was collected in so-called Songbooks. Common themes included polite love, addressed to a lady of almost divine qualities (to whom the poet declares his vassalage), or moral reflections on serious matters, such as the shortness of life, fortune, or death.
Three great courtier poets of the fifteenth century belong to this current:
- The Marquis de Santillana
- Juan de Mena
- Jorge Manrique
Verses on the Death of His Father (Jorge Manrique)
Jorge Manrique was a gentleman who actively participated in the civil strife of the time and died in battle. Apart from a few other poems, his classic of Spanish literature is Verses on the Death of His Father.
This masterpiece is a funeral elegy in which, after general reflections on death, Manrique expresses his personal sorrow at the demise of his father. He praises his father’s moral and human virtues and confronts his death, comforted by the memory of his exploits and good works.
The poem, which has 40 stanzas, is a funeral elegy motivated by the death of his father. It can be divided into three parts:
- General Reflection on Life and Death (Stanzas I-XIII): This section discusses the transient nature of existence, the fleeting value of worldly things, and the contrast between earthly life and eternity. This first part has a didactic and exemplary tone.
- The Power of Death and Time (Stanzas XIV-XXIV): The themes of death and time, previously discussed in general terms, are illustrated with examples. Manrique presents a parade of illustrious contemporaries whose social status and wealth did not save them from death: kings, princes, courtiers, etc.
- Tribute to His Dead Father (Stanzas XXV-XL): Manrique extols his father’s virtues and accomplishments. Finally, death arrives and comforts Manrique with the promise of a better afterlife. These stanzas represent the apex of the poem.
The language of the poem is simple and reverent. Manrique adopts a contemplative tone and prefers simple metaphors and repetition. The stanzas of pie quebrado (six verses of four and eight syllables with rhyme) accentuate the rhythm of the poem, which is both solemn and agile.
C) La Celestina
La Celestina is entirely dialogue-based and intended to be read aloud, as its great length makes it difficult to stage. First published in 1499, the first editions consisted of sixteen acts and bore the title Comedy of Calisto and Melibea. Subsequently, five more acts were added, and the title was refined to Tragicomedy of Calisto and Melibea. Finally, it came to be called La Celestina, after the name of the old go-between.
Fernando de Rojas is considered the author of all or most of the work. Some critics attribute the first act to an anonymous author.
A true reflection of the moral, social, and cultural crisis of fifteenth-century life, La Celestina is a mix of the popular and the cultured, characters of humble and high status, joyful abandon and moral purpose, the comic and the tragic. Its main characters are drawn into a conflict that leads to misery and death.
La Celestina, which marks the transition between the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, is a classic of universal value for several reasons:
- The significance of its themes: love, greed, and death.
- The characterization: especially the old Celestina, one of the great creations of literature.
- The depth with which it reflects the conflict between two mentalities (medieval and Renaissance) and two social groups (the noble and the humble).
The genre of the work has been much debated. La Celestina is difficult to categorize. The absence of narration and its dialogue form suggest a dramatic component, but its length and the peculiar use of time and space make it virtually unstageable. Some scholars include it within the narrative genre.
Argument
Calisto, a handsome young nobleman, enters the garden of the beautiful Melibea while chasing a hawk and falls in love with her. When she rejects him, he goes to an old bawd, Celestina.
Celestina, through spells, arranges for the young people to meet and enjoy their love. The bawd enlists the help of Calisto’s servants, Pármeno and Sempronius, by offering them two of her prostitutes, Elicia and Areúsa. The servants also want to participate in the profits, but Celestina refuses. They stab her and are subsequently caught and hanged.
One night, Calisto slips and falls while climbing Melibea’s garden wall and dies. Melibea, in despair, commits suicide by jumping from the top of a tower. The book ends with the cries of Melibea’s father before the body of his daughter.
Topics
From a thematic point of view, La Celestina has two major themes: love and death. The young Calisto and Melibea are slaves to love, and Celestina is the instigator of that irrepressible passion that brings misfortune. Greed, on the other hand, dominates the bawd and Calisto’s servants.
Death is the bitter end of most of the characters. They want to live fast and enjoy the pleasures of life, but they become victims of fate and their own passions: Celestina and Calisto’s servants are killed, Calisto falls to his death by accident, and Melibea commits suicide, ignoring the pleas of her parents.