Generation of ’27: Spanish Poetry Renaissance
Pedro Salinas
Life
Born in Madrid in 1891. He taught at various universities, including Seville, where he was a professor to Luis Cernuda. When the Civil War broke out, he was in the U.S., where he remained until his death in 1951.
Poetic Career
His work is divided into three stages:
- Pure Poetry: Part of the lineage of Juan Ramón Jiménez’s pure poetry, although certain compositions show the influence of Futurism on topics such as the typewriter, the telephone, light, and film. This includes works like Presagios (1923), Seguro azar (1929), and Fábula (1931).
- Love Poetry: With La voz a ti debida (1933) and Razón de amor (1936), Salinas became a renowned poet of love. This sentiment gives fullness to existence and meaning to the world.
- Poetry of Exile: He abandons loving isolation and reconnects with society. His works represent a struggle between faith in life and surrounding anxieties: El Contemplado (1946), Todo más claro (1949), and Confianza (1955).
From a metrical perspective, Salinas generally uses short and free verse and strophic structures not subject to measurement or perfect rhymes. Stylistically, he creates a universe of meaning through simple vocabulary, colloquial phrases, and short verses.
Jorge Guillén
Life
Born in Valladolid in 1893. He befriended Salinas in his youth. He was a lecturer at the Sorbonne, earned a PhD in 1924 with a thesis on Góngora, and served as a professor of literature at the universities of Murcia, Oxford, and Seville. The Civil War found him in Seville, and he was imprisoned. In 1938, he escaped to the United States, where he lived for many years as a professor of Spanish literature. He received the Cervantes Prize in 1976 and died in Málaga in 1984.
Style and Metrics
His poetic style is close to pure poetry. Careful design and typographic arrangement of verses, along with precise organization of poems, create a feeling of extreme neatness. Feeling is subordinated to intelligence and technical writing, expressing emotions starkly and essentially. Metrically, Guillén uses short verses and condensed stanzas, like the décima. The syntax is hidden, and the noun, which names the essence of things, prevails over other parts of speech.
Poetic Career
Guillén’s work is a unified whole, structured organically. Its overall title is Aire nuestro and is composed of five books: Cántico (1950), Clamor (1967), Homenaje (1967), …Y otros poemas (1973), and Final (1981).
Gerardo Diego
Life
(Santander, 1896 – Madrid, 1987). In his youth, he was a great innovator, involved in avant-garde movements like Creationism. He taught at institutes in various cities and compiled the Antología de la poesía española contemporánea (1932). He received the Cervantes Prize in 1979.
Work
His work can be classified as follows:
- Traditional and Folk Poetry: El romancero de la novia (1918), Soria (1922), Versos humanos (1925), and Alondra de verdad (1931) develop a wide range of themes (religion, love, humanity, landscapes) in traditional and classical verse forms (songs, glosses, romances, sonnets, décimas). He drew inspiration from Modernism and Juan Ramón Jiménez.
- Avant-garde Poetry: Imagen (1922) and Manual de espumas (1924) are Creationist works. These compositions present various themes with striking and irrational images.
Vicente Aleixandre
Life
(Seville, 1898 – Madrid, 1984). He spent his childhood in Málaga, which left a lasting impression. In 1909, he moved to Madrid, where he studied commerce. Starting in 1925, an illness forced him to remain at rest for long periods. By then, he began writing poetry. After the war, his teaching and encouragement stimulated the vocation of many young poets. He received the Nobel Prize in 1977.
Poetic Career
For Aleixandre, poetry is communication, “a visionary fusion of man and creation.” Communication is a constant in his work. These are the stages of his poetic career:
Surrealist Poetry
Aleixandre uses Surrealist techniques to express his desire to unite man with nature, allowing him to share in its perfection and gifts. In Espadas como labios (1932), La destrucción o el amor (1935), and Sombra del paraíso (1944), love is the destructive force that leads humans to a more authentic life and helps them merge with nature.
Forgotten Poem
Personal concerns and solidarity with others emerge. He abandons Surrealism and communicates with humanity. Historia del corazón (1954) and En un vasto dominio (1965) are notable works from this period.
Meditative Poetry
Without losing communication with nature and man, the poet communicates with himself through philosophical poems containing images and symbols from his Surrealist phase. Poemas de la consumación (1968) and Diálogos del conocimiento (1974) represent this stage, which investigates the meaning of life and the world.
Overall, Aleixandre’s poetry is pessimistic and challenging due to the visionary images that shape his style. He uses long or short verses in line with the intensity of the expressed feeling.
Dámaso Alonso
Life
(Madrid, 1898 – Madrid, 1990). He studied Philology and became an unparalleled professor and researcher. His studies on Góngora sparked his generation’s interest in the poet. He directed the Royal Spanish Academy of Language for many years and received the Cervantes Prize in 1978.
Poetic Career
His poetry began with Poemas puros. Poemillas de la ciudad (1921) under Modernist and Juan Ramón Jiménez’s influences. The same influences are found in El viento y el verso (1923-1924). He virtually stopped publishing poetry until after the war, with Oscura noticia (1944) and, especially, Hijos de la ira (1944), a book belonging to the poetry of uprootedness. His later titles, Hombre y Dios (1955) and Duda y amor sobre el Ser Supremo (1985), express his conflicted relationship with the Creator.
Federico García Lorca
Life and Personality
Born in Fuente Vaqueros (Granada) in 1898. He traveled to New York. Back in Spain, he founded a university theater group, “La Barraca” (1932), to promote Spanish classical theater. He was shot in 1936. His personality had two conflicting aspects: he was vital and optimistic, yet also pessimistic and anxious.
Poetic Career
Stages:
- Andalusian and Popular: Present in Canciones (1927), Poema del cante jondo, and especially in Romancero gitano (1928), where the link between the surreal and the popular reaches its peak. He chooses the Roma as protagonists, who appear as marginalized figures in a hostile society.
- Surrealist: During his stay in America, he wrote Poeta en Nueva York (1929-1930), a collection of surrealist poems. It’s a cry of protest against industrial civilization, which he saw as inhuman and cruel.
- Later Works: Upon returning to Spain, he wrote Llanto por Ignacio Sánchez Mejías (1935), an elegy dedicated to the death of the bullfighter; Diván del Tamarit (1936), influenced by ancient Arab-Andalusian songs; and Sonetos del amor oscuro (written between 1935 and 1936), where erotic love and the pleasure of enjoyment reappear strongly.
Rafael Alberti
Life
Born in El Puerto de Santa María in 1902. In 1917, he moved with his family to Madrid and abandoned his painting studies. Incipient tuberculosis led him to a sanatorium, where his literary vocation grew, and he wrote Marinero en tierra. He met Lorca, Dalí, and Buñuel, frequented the Residencia de Estudiantes, and participated in the homage to Góngora. During the Civil War, he was actively involved with the Republicans. He went into exile in Buenos Aires. From 1963, he settled in Rome and returned to Spain in 1977. He died in 1999.
Poetic Career
His poetry is based on the longing for what has been lost over the years: El Puerto de Santa María, the sea, and, especially, Spain. Like Lorca, he combines Spanish tradition with the European avant-garde. His poetic development can be divided into stages:
- Populism and Neo-popular Poetry: He recreates forms and themes from traditional Spanish literature, drawing inspiration from Garcilaso de la Vega and Gil Vicente, among others, and incorporates avant-garde trends. Works from this period include: Marinero en tierra (1924), La amante (1925), and El alba del alhelí (1925-1926).
- Learned Poetry: This short period shows a clear influence of Baroque culteranismo, sometimes combined with futuristic themes. Cal y canto (1926-1927) stands out.
- Avant-garde Poetry: Alberti is drawn to Surrealism, and under its influence, he writes Sobre los ángeles (1927-1928), a major Spanish avant-garde work. He finds it the ideal vehicle to convey his internal contradictions, thoughts, and pain.
- Committed Poetry: A combative tone of protest addresses political and social issues of the Civil War. These are poems committed to the Republican cause and strongly influenced by Marxist ideas. Personal themes are abandoned. Con los zapatos puestos tengo que morir (1930), El poeta en la calle (1931-1936), and De un momento a otro (1932-1938) are notable works.
- Poetry of Exile: Longing for the lost homeland and rejection of fascism are frequent themes. Over the years, Alberti partially heals the wounds of war and cultivates a personalized poetry in which avant-garde influence, socio-political poetry, and humor remain present. He combines traditional forms with innovative ones. Entre el clavel y la espada (1941), Retornos de lo vivo lejano (1952), Pleamar (1942-1944), and Roma, peligro para caminantes (1968) are compositions with these traits.
Luis Cernuda
Life and Personality
He was a student of Salinas at the University of Seville, where he was born in 1902. He lived in Madrid and Toulouse. From 1938 until his death, he lived in exile, first as a teacher in England and the USA, and later in Mexico.
Cernuda was unique in the group due to his tendency towards loneliness, pessimism, bitterness, and rebellion. He attributed his attitude to his rebellious Protestant streak and his homosexuality, which made him feel like an outsider.
Poetic Career
In his collected poetry, La realidad y el deseo, he expresses his discontent with the world, as reality cannot fulfill his desires. He combines pain and love. The inability to realize his hopes leads him to isolation and loneliness: “Odio la realidad como tengo por odioso todo lo que le pertenece: mis amigos, mi familia, mi patria. No conozco nada, no quiero nada; y si algo pudiera esperar, sólo sería morirme allí donde no hubiera llegado todavía esta civilización grotesca que se vanaglorian los hombres.”
His poetic career can be divided into these stages:
- Surrealist Poetry: Although his early work cultivates the pure poetry of Juan Ramón Jiménez and classical forms, he soon opts for Surrealism, as this avant-garde movement allows him to express his inner world and the rebellion of choosing forbidden love. Works from this period include: Un río, un amor (1929), Los placeres prohibidos (1931), and Donde habite el olvido (1932-1933).
- Exile Poetry: Concern for the lost homeland appears in works such as Las nubes (1937-1940), which adopts a more objective and thoughtful tone, reflecting on reality, time, existence, and faith.
- Personalized and Intimate Poetry: With Desolación de la quimera (1956-1962), he returns to exploring his inner world with a bitter tone.
Metrically, he uses long verses but sometimes experiments with regular metrical forms (poetry of exile). Stylistically, he employs simple and colloquial language.
Manuel Altolaguirre
Altolaguirre (Málaga, 1905 – Burgos, 1959) is possibly the most spiritual and intimate poet of the Generation of ’27. His compositions show the influence of San Juan de la Cruz, Garcilaso, Juan Ramón Jiménez, and Salinas. His works include: Las islas invitadas (1926), Poemas de agua (1927), Soledades juntas (1931), and La lenta libertad (1936). In addition to poetry, he wrote a memoir, El caballo griego; literary criticism; translations; and plays, Amor de madre and El espacio.
Emilio Prados
Life
Born in Málaga in 1899. From 1939, he lived in Mexico, where he died in 1962.
Poetic Career
His work is divided into four stages:
- Early Poetry (1920-1928): Marked by popular forms and the influence of Juan Ramón Jiménez. Tiempo and Cuerpo perseguido are notable works.
- Surrealist Phase (1932-1935): Two books exemplify this avant-garde trend: La voz cautiva and Andando, andando por el mundo.
- Political Poetry (1933-1937): The war led him to compose poems of struggle, collected in Llanto en la sangre and Cancionero menor para los combatientes.
- Exile (1940-1956): Themes such as existential problems, longing for the lost homeland, and freedom are prominent. The main works are: Jardín cerrado and Río natural.
A Generation of ’27 Epigone: Miguel Hernández
He has been classified as a follower of the Generation of ’27 or as belonging to the Generation of ’36. Either way, his evolution is significant in understanding the direction of poetry in the years preceding and following the Civil War. Miguel Hernández had a remarkable life. A goatherd with limited education in his childhood, his willingness and desire to learn led him to become self-taught. In 1934, he moved to Madrid: his friendships with some poets of the Generation of ’27, especially Pablo Neruda, influenced his ideological and poetic evolution. A staunch defender of the Republic, he fought as a soldier and was taken prisoner. He died in prison in Alicante in 1942.
Themes of his Poetry
Miguel Hernández’s poetry is rooted in the cycles of nature. The themes revolve around the following axes:
- Life and Love: Symbolized in the home and the wife-mother, whose womb becomes a hope for the future.
- Death: It pushes man towards doom and is sometimes identified with the bull, a tragic and dignified animal born to die fighting.
- Political Commitment and the Struggle for Social Justice.
Stages
The evolution of his work is divided into several stages linked to his biography:
- First Stage: After some less relevant poems, he published his first book in a Gongorine style, Perito en lunas (1934), written in octaves and influenced by the Generation of ’27. El rayo que no cesa (1936) marked the beginning of his artistic maturity. This work explores themes such as fate and death in the impressive Elegía a Ramón Sijé. Later poems, such as Oda a Pablo Neruda entre sangre y fuego, delve into deeper issues.
- Second Stage: With the war, his political commitment is reflected in Viento del pueblo (1937), where combat poetry, written in straightforward language and propaganda, gives way to social concern. In El hombre acecha (1939), he expresses his dismay at the tragedy of the Civil War and the feeling of defeat. It is addressed to Vicente Aleixandre. In this stage, classic verses (quatrains, décimas, broken-foot stanzas) alternate with long verses, free pentameter, or Alexandrines.
- Third Stage: It encompasses the poems written in prison, Cancionero y romancero de ausencias (1938-1941). These compositions revolve around the sense of absence: that of his first child, who died; his second child and his wife, whom he cannot see; and the lack of freedom. Pain fills his verses, and hunger reappears, inspiring one of his most beautiful poems: Nanas de la cebolla. Miguel Hernández recalls a war that has only caused hatred and plunged humanity into sadness. But even so, he raises the banner of love, which represents hope.