Modernism in Literature: Key Aspects, Influences, and Authors
Modernism in Literature
Modernism was an artistic movement that emerged in the late 19th century, reaching Spain from Latin America. Modernists considered realism vulgar, lacking spirituality, and devoid of artistic beauty. They aimed to renew poetic language and restore beauty to art.
The Modernist Lyric
The pursuit of beauty was a central obsession in modernist forms.
- Metrics: Modernists sought musicality and rhythm, using nine-syllable, ten-syllable, and dodecasyllable verses, and revived the Alexandrine. They also used sharp rhymes.
- Style: The style was elevated and refined, with poems full of cultisms and figures of speech such as alliteration, synesthesia, and symbols, aiming to evoke sensations.
Key Topics in Modernist Poetry
- Sensuality: Exalting hedonism and sensual pleasure through nature, women, perfumes, and music.
- Exoticism: The poet’s need to escape reality by exploring distant places (China, India) or times (Greece, Middle Ages).
- Universalism: The poet’s preference for a cosmopolitan, aristocratic, and exquisite language.
- Inwardness, Melancholy, and Existential Angst: The author projects their moods and inner feelings onto landscapes and objects.
- Love: Often delicate, idealized, and sublime, but frequently unrequited. Modernist poets often included sensual and heroic references in their compositions.
- Days of Glory: Stories, landscapes, and Hispanic heroes were incorporated into modernist aesthetics, either as a way to escape into pre-Columbian times or to find their own identity and resist U.S. mandates.
- The Hispanic: Subject matter, similar to the Generation of ’98, focused on the defense of Spanish culture.
- Escape: The rejection of reality led to the creation of ideal modernist worlds through imagination and dreams.
Influences on Modernism
- France: Symbolists and Parnassians were highly influential. Modernists adopted the Symbolist ideal of creating art full of symbols that the reader would recognize. From the Parnassians, they took the concept of formal perfection, viewing the poem as a perfect structure.
- USA: Edgar Allan Poe and Walt Whitman. From them, they adopted themes of mystery and love.
- Britain: The dandyism of Oscar Wilde, with his concept of the refinement of art and the consideration of beauty as an absolute value.
Key Modernist Authors
Manuel Machado (1874-1947)
Manuel Machado was deeply familiar with the works of Rubén Darío, as well as the Symbolists and Parnassians. He was from Seville. His notable works include Alma, Apolo, and Cante Hondo, which also reflects Andalusian folklore. His poems often depict bohemian life, traditional Spanish customs, superficial love affairs, intimacy, and historical figures of Spain.
Rubén Darío (1867-1916)
Born in Nicaragua, Rubén Darío (originally Félix Rubén García Sarmiento) was a diplomat who traveled throughout America and Europe. He visited Spain in 1892 to mark the centenary of the discovery of America and is considered the leading exponent of this movement.
Works: Azul, Prosas Profanas, Cantos de Vida y Esperanza.
Rubén Darío’s themes included exoticism, cosmopolitanism, sensuality, intimacy, and indigenous and Hispanic themes.
Literary Generation (Julius Petersen’s Requirements)
To discuss a literary generation, the following requirements must be met:
- An age difference of no more than 10 years between the oldest and youngest members.
- Similar cultural and intellectual backgrounds.
- Close personal relationships among members.
- Participation in joint events.
- The existence of a defining event that unites the generation.
- The presence and recognition of a guide.
- The use of a common language.
- Acceptance or rejection of the previous generation’s group.