Baroque Literature: Style, Drama, and Poetry
Baroque Literature
Contrasts, Conceits, and Culteranismo
Baroque literature is marked by strong contrasts. The sonnet and romance forms reach a peak of perfection.
Two main tendencies define the Baroque style: conceptismo and culteranismo. Conceptismo, represented by Francisco de Quevedo and Baltasar Gracián, emphasizes ingenuity and wit. Culteranismo, championed by Luis de Góngora, focuses on formal beauty and elaborate language.
Conceptismo
This style reflects the Baroque aesthetic centered on intellect and ideas. It employs paradoxes, antitheses, and polysemy, often using metaphors. Quevedo and Gracián are key figures in this movement.
Culteranismo
Continuing a trend initiated by Fernando de Herrera, culteranismo aimed to create a poetic language distinct from common speech, using intensified literary resources. Culterano writers pursued formal brilliance through metaphors and mythological allusions, with Góngora as the prime example.
Alongside these two styles, a simpler poetic model emerged, represented by Lope de Vega.
Baroque Theater
17th-Century Drama
During the Baroque period, drama reached its peak, gaining immense popularity with playwrights like Lope de Vega and Calderón de la Barca. This success underscored the rise of public theaters (corrales de comedias), coexisting with religious and courtly drama, all forms originating in the previous century.
Public Theaters (Corrales de Comedias)
Popular theater flourished in 17th-century Spain, much like in England with Shakespeare. These theaters were the most popular entertainment of the time.
Stages lacked scenery and often curtains. The audience, a mix of commoners and musketeers, stood during performances.
Representations took place in daylight, starting early afternoon and lasting several hours. An entremés, a short, usually humorous piece, was staged after the first act. Songs or dances were performed, and the show concluded with a farce after the third act.
All plays performed in these theaters were termed “comedies,” encompassing both comedies and dramas blending tragic and comic elements. The word “comedy” thus acquired a broader meaning.
Religious Drama
Religious drama manifested in autos sacramentales, short one-act plays featuring allegorical characters. Performed during Corpus Christi feasts, these plays served to explain Catholic doctrines to the public.
Courtly Theater
Performed in palace halls and gardens, courtly theater, especially under Philip VI’s reign, saw innovations in stage design, enabling spectacular effects. These advancements, showcased in mythological or fantastical comedies, captivated court audiences.
Lope de Vega (1562-1635)
Life
Lope de Vega led a tumultuous life. Born in Madrid to humble beginnings, he was self-taught and worked as a secretary to nobles. His life was marked by intense love affairs and deep religiosity.
He faced exile, multiple marriages, the deaths of his wife and son, priesthood, and a return to writing and romance. Further family tragedies preceded his death.
Lope de Vega’s extensive and varied work includes poetry, novels, and above all, a revitalized theater.
Theater of Lope de Vega
At the end of the 16th century, Lope de Vega introduced a simpler, more dynamic theater that resonated with public taste. This new form was called the “new comedy.”
The New Comedy
This dramatic form, created by Lope de Vega, introduced numerous innovations:
- Rejection of the three classical unities.
- Three-act structure.
- Blending of tragedy and comedy.
- Use of diverse verse forms.
- Decorum: matching language to character type.
- The figure of the gracioso (witty character).
- Incorporation of lyrical elements.
Themes and Characters
Lope de Vega championed freedom in subject matter, exploring religious, historical, legendary, and contemporary themes. However, he recognized the public’s preference for conflicts of honor.
His works are categorized by theme:
- Religious plays.
- Spanish history and legend (e.g., The Knight from Olmedo, Peribañez and the Commander of Ocaña, Fuenteovejuna).
- Contemporary comedies of love and intrigue.
Lope de Vega’s characters are defined by their actions rather than their inner being, becoming archetypes: the king, the knight, the villain, the lover, the lady, the gracioso, and the maid.
Lope de Vega’s School
Following his theatrical success, many writers adopted his model, notably Guillén de Castro and Tirso de Molina.
Baroque Lyric Poetry and Prose
Themes and Lyrical Forms
of the Baroque
In the seventeenth century, lyric poetry achieved high quality and very varied in themes, tones and shapes. The poets that showcase this variation are Francisco de Quevedo and Luis de Gongora. Next to them stands Lope de Vega, in a more natural.