Medieval Spanish Literature: Epic Poems to Prose
1. The Epic Poem
Epic poetry has always existed to exalt heroes, encourage warriors, and strengthen national sentiment. This type of poetry follows lyric poetry and is rare in the literature of primitive peoples.
Medieval Romantic Epic
The medieval romantic epic is constituted by so-called epics. Among the French chanson de geste, Chanson de Roland (eleventh century) stands out. A few preserved Castilian songs include a snippet of Roncesvalles, the Cantar de Mio Cid, Poema de Fernán González, and the Mocedades de Rodrigo.
El Cantar de Mio Cid
El Cantar de Mio Cid is the only Castilian epic poem preserved almost entirely. The surviving manuscript is from the fourteenth century and states it was written by Per Abbat. El Cantar de Mio Cid tells the story of the last years of Rodrigo Diaz de Vivar’s life, a knight in the court of Castile and Leon.
The poem exalts the figure of the Cid, a man of lesser noble lineage who valued loyalty and effort, as opposed to wealthy men. The hero is presented as a valiant, careful knight, a good husband and father, an exemplary subject, and a fervent Christian.
Unlike the heroes of the French epic, D. Rodrigo is represented with the fundamental characteristic of moderation: he is prudent, balanced, shrewd, and cunning. He is a flat character, as he always shows the same attitude.
The poem is based on two main issues:
- Recovery of honor: Exiled by the king due to false accusations, Rodrigo carries out a series of feats to regain his lost honor, increasing his fame and wealth.
- Recovery of honor after the Cid suffers a personal affront: His sons-in-law, the heirs of Carrión, mistreat and abandon his daughters in the oak grove of Corpes. D. Rodrigo achieves a second restoration of honor by winning a trial by combat and arranging new marriages for his daughters with the princes of Navarre and Aragon.
The poem presents an irregular meter. The lines vary between 10 and 20 syllables, divided by a caesura, thus separating two hemistiches, which are grouped into stanzas. The rhyme is assonance.
Structure:
- Song of Exile: Recounts the events from the Cid’s departure from Vivar to his victory over the Count of Barcelona.
- Song of the Wedding: Extends from the beginning of the Levantine campaign until the weddings of his daughters with the Infantes of Carrión.
- Song of the Shame of Corpes: Extends from the scene of the lion in the den to the denouement, with the triumph of the Cid.
In the story, there are ellipses and foreshadowing of events that will later be recounted.
Due to its oral transmission, a dominant feature is the use of formulas:
- Formulas with conative and phatic function
- Epic epithets
2. The Mester de Clerecía
The Mester de Clerecía arose in the thirteenth century and involves a series of works with common characteristics:
- Narrative texts, religious or heroic
- Moral or didactic intention
- Authors claim to be educated, referring to the written sources they depart from
- Written in verse and use a regular meter, the cuaderna vía (four Alexandrine verses with monorhyme)
Anonymous Works
A group of Mester de Clerecía works are anonymous. These include: Libro de Alexandre, whose hero is Alexander the Great; Libro de Apolonio, a love and adventure story that depicts the life of Apollonius; and the poem Fernán González, which exalts the figure of the Castilian count who gained independence for Castile from León.
Gonzalo de Berceo
With the Mester de Clerecía, authorial consciousness is born. Gonzalo de Berceo is the first Castilian poet who abandoned the anonymity of epic authorship and proudly proclaimed his name.
Berceo’s poems are addressed to monks, priests, and novices, who transmitted the teaching of the doctrine to the faithful by preaching in the vernacular.
Berceo’s production includes three types of work:
- Hagiographic works (lives of saints)
- Marian works (miracles of the Virgin)
- Doctrinal works
Milagros de Nuestra Señora
The work is divided into two parts: an introduction and a set of 25 miracles.
- Introduction: The protagonist is the narrator, who identifies himself with Berceo. He is presented as a rosemary bush in a garden described as the locus amoenus (pleasant place). This place is associated with the Virgin Mary, a symbol of the recovery of paradise. The rosemary, which symbolizes fallen man, is searching for lost grace.
- Miracles: The 25 narratives exemplify the compassionate actions of Mary and her powerful intercession before Christ, serving as a demonstration of the doctrine set forth in the introduction.
Libro de Buen Amor
The Libro de Buen Amor is presented as an autobiography structured in a series of adventures.
Among the love episodes, the extended story of Don Melon and Doña Endrina stands out, which involves a mediator called Trotaconventos. In other episodes, the female protagonists are nuns, blueberries, mountain girls, etc.
The protagonist, who embodies several characters, recounts his love experiences. The book also includes a wide variety of lyric pieces and two allegorical compositions in meter: the protagonist’s debate with Don Amor and the battle between Don Carnal and Doña Cuaresma.
In the prose prologue, the author presents two purposes: to teach and to collect his poetic compositions.
The author states that his intention was to induce good love; the cases presented are examples of bad love affairs that should be avoided.
The Libro de Buen Amor incorporates vernacular language, which is particularly evident in the use of proverbs, in calling attention to the listener, and in the use of sexual euphemisms.
3. The Romances
The romances are narrative poems intended to be sung and are anonymous.
In general, they consist of verses of 8 syllables, which may vary, with assonance rhyme in pairs, and some with consonant rhyme.
Old Romances
These are documented in the late Middle Ages and the mid-sixteenth century.
New Romances
These are the ones composed in the late sixteenth century, imitating the style of the old ones.
Classification of Romances
- Heroic Theme: Derived from a medieval epic poem or other literary source, and are recastings. They extol the virtues of heroes and kings.
- Carolingian Theme: Include French romances that address matters of the French epic and romantic ballads on characters from the roman courtois.
- Historical Theme: Refer to historical events of medieval Castilian history.
- Frontier Theme: Narrate episodes of border struggles between Christians and Muslims.
- Fiction Romances: Present subdivisions of unfaithful love, unrequited love, adultery, incest, seduction, teasing, etc.
- Biblical and Greco-Roman Religious Romances: Narrate episodes from the Bible, the apocryphal gospels, hagiographic legends, and Greco-Roman antiquity.
Romances do not always respect the chronological order of the narrative, although it is sometimes broken. It is customary to start in medias res and end abruptly in suspense, leaving an effect of uncertainty on the audience.
Characteristics of Romances
- Use of verbs in the present and imperfect tenses in contexts where one would use the present perfect.
- Use of the initial Latin f and the paragogic e as phonetic features.
- Repetitions of the same verse between two hemistiches.
- Frequent use of antithesis and enumerations, among other resources.
4. Medieval Narrative Prose
The first manifestations of medieval Castilian prose are from the late twelfth and early thirteenth centuries and have no literary intent.
Enxiemplos Collections (Examples)
In the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, a movement developed to offer Christian education to the people.
The first collections – Sendebar and Kalila e Dimna – are from the thirteenth century and are composed of Indian stories translated from Arabic. These are framed stories.
Alfonso X the Wise
Castilian prose was consolidated at the instigation of King Alfonso X the Wise. His works, the fruit of collective work, can be classified into:
- Historical: Estoria de España and General Estoria.
- Legal: Siete Partidas.
- Scientific: Tablas Alfonsíes.
- Leisure: Libro de ajedrez.
Don Juan Manuel
Don Juan Manuel belonged to the highest nobility, and his works were based on observation of his domains and the ambition to increase his economic and social power. In his writings, he defended a social order based on the three estates: oratores, bellatores, and laboratores.
El Conde Lucanor
In El Conde Lucanor, Don Juan Manuel picked up the Dominican tradition of entertaining and accessible education. The book is divided into five parts:
- Part 1: Contains 51 enxiemplos that reflect the teachings of a master (Patronio) to his disciple (Count Lucanor). In each story, the Count asks his tutor about a problem, and the tutor tells him a story from which the solution can be derived. At the end of each tale, Juan Manuel introduces himself as a character in the third person and outlines the moral with a couplet.
- Parts 2, 3, 4: Contain cultured sayings that exalt, above all, the virtue of prudence.
- Part 5: Serves as a conclusion and focuses on the Christian life.
5. The Novel in the Fifteenth Century
This period saw the rise of chivalric adventure (libros de caballerías) and ideal love (sentimental novel).
Novels of Chivalry
These novels narrate the adventures of a knight-errant who undertakes a journey, facing various trials and supernatural elements. These novels originate in the fantasy world of Britain, with the legend of King Arthur and his knights. The most important work, Amadis de Gaula, reached its final form in the early sixteenth century but was already circulating in the mid-fourteenth century. The action of Amadis takes place in real spaces alternating with exotic locations.
The Sentimental Novel
These novels focus on the emotional states and internal conflicts of the characters. They develop a love story with a sad ending and a tragic view of love. The lovers often die, and the cruel lady often appears, rejecting her suitors.
Stylistic resources such as antithesis, paradoxes, and allegories abound. The prototype of this novel is Cárcel de amor, by Diego San Pedro.
6. La Celestina
La Celestina was published in the late fifteenth century and was printed in Castilian in Spain and other countries, as well as being translated into other languages. Acts II to XXI are attributed to Fernando de Rojas.
Argument
Calisto, rejected by Melibea, goes (on the advice of his servant Sempronio) to a procuress, Celestina.
Rewarded by Calisto, Celestina convinces Melibea to have an appointment with him. Sempronio and another servant, Pármeno, demand their share of the spoils from Celestina, but she refuses and is murdered. When Calisto arrives to meet Melibea, he falls from a ladder and dies, and Melibea then commits suicide by jumping from a tower.
In the 1512 version, the work is longer, and the lovers do not die after their first night of love but later.
Genre: Drama or Novel?
La Celestina is situated in the context of humanistic comedy, which was read aloud in university settings and not performed on stage. It inherits from this tradition the presentation of events in different periods, the action taking place in various locations, the uncertain duration of events, the long monologues, and anticlericalism.
Modalities of Discourse
The discourse of the characters in La Celestina has three modes:
- Dialogue: Alternating long and rhetorical interventions with quick verbal exchanges.
- Monologue
- Aside: Does not always have a humorous role in La Celestina.
Treatment of Love
- Parody of courtly love: At the beginning of the book, Calisto commits the first transgression of the rules of courtly love by skipping the waiting period. (Calisto is the opposite of a courtly lover).
- Magic: Celestina resorts to magic to bring Melibea to Calisto.
- Love as Madness: The idea of love as a form of madness. At the time Rojas composed the work, this sentiment was viewed as a type of madness. This alienation will prey on Melibea and drive her to suicide.
- Physical Love: Love is presented as physical, sexual love. Celestina emphasizes not only physical pleasure but also the spiritual delight that sex produces.
- Reprimand of Love: After Calisto’s death, Melibea’s suicide serves as a condemnation of passionate love.
Characters
The characters are defined by their speech and by the judgments of other characters:
- Calisto: Represents a parody of courtly love and the madness of love. He is foolish and selfish.
- Melibea: The true tragic character of the work. Some critics believe that she is a victim of Celestina’s spell, while others think that Celestina only helps her discover her love for Calisto through words.
- Celestina: The procuress is an attack against everything established. She has dedicated her life to the trade of sexuality. She is very intelligent and knows how to defeat her opponents through words.
- Pármeno and Sempronio: Calisto’s servants.
- Elicia and Areúsa: After Calisto’s death, they seek to avenge the loss of their lovers.
- Pleberio and Alisa: Pleberio appears in the last two acts, particularly in the final scene (lamenting Melibea’s death). His wife, Alisa, remains a secondary character.
Purpose of the Work
The purpose of La Celestina is original, complex, and ambiguous. Some studies emphasize its moralizing intention (to show the destructiveness of mad love and to warn against the depravity of procuresses and false servants). Other critics argue that the work is dominated by a disillusioned and pessimistic vision of the world, where human beings are helpless and defenseless against fate, without order or rules governing their conduct.
Style of La Celestina
Most of the characters in La Celestina use language suited to the situation and subject matter. A characteristic feature is the reproduction of popular wisdom through a large number of sentences and sayings.
- Authorship
- Argument
- Genre
- Treatment of love
- Characters
- Purpose of the work