Pre-Renaissance Literature and Culture
The Pre-Renaissance (15th Century)
This period at the end of the Middle Ages saw a shift in attitudes and perspectives towards life, art, and religion. Literature focused on humanity and earthly existence, with writers addressing themes like wealth, death, and the enjoyment of life.
Society and Culture
The pre-Renaissance saw the rise of the bourgeoisie and flourishing commerce. Culture became a mark of distinction between nobles and wealthy bourgeois, with courts and universities replacing monasteries as centers of learning. In this environment, humanism spread—a movement embracing the classical cultures of Greece and Rome.
Humanism and Literature
Humanism marked the return of Greco-Roman literature, whose authors and works became models for imitation. It revitalized Italian literature, which, in turn, influenced other European literature.
Important Italian Writers
- Boccaccio (1313-1375)
- Petrarch (1304-1374)
- Dante Alighieri (1265-1321), author of The Divine Comedy
A typical theme for these writers was “courtly love,” a puzzle-like game centered on an idealized mistress. This theme continued into 15th-century poetry.
Changes in Literature
- Authors took pride in their work and signed their writings, unlike the anonymity common in medieval literature.
- There was a move away from the religious didacticism of previous centuries.
- The figure of the courtier writer emerged—a noble dedicated to both arms and letters.
Types of Poetry
Cancionero Poetry
This type viewed courtly love as a game and literary pursuit. The poet acted as a servant to his lady, crafting verses adorned with ingenuity and conceptual elaboration.
Allegorical Poetry
This type addressed philosophical issues like wealth, fame, and death in a high and artful style. Key figures include the Marquis de Santillana (Comedieta of Ponza) and Juan de Mena (Laberinto de Fortuna).
Romance
These poems consist of an indefinite series of eight-syllable lines with assonant rhyme in pairs. Anonymous and descended from the Mester of Minstrelsy, they present a variety of themes with expressive and dramatic concentration.
Transmitted orally, romances feature variations, dialogues, abrupt endings, and a sense of mystery.
Types of Romances
- Epic (battles of other nations)
- Loss of Spain (e.g., the story of King Rodrigo’s defeat by the Arabs)
- Reconquista (reconquest of Spain)
- Cid (episodes not found in the Poem of the Cid)
- Historical and News (stories close to their time, serving to relay news—15th century)
- Love and Chivalry (fictional stories, usually of adventure and love)
- Arthurian (King Arthur and his knights)
- Biblical (Bible stories)
- Ancient (Troy, old ballads, etc.)
New Romances
While anonymous romances from the Middle Ages continued, their success led to the creation of new, original, and signed romances in the 16th and 17th centuries. This tradition continued with writers like Lope de Vega, Quevedo, Góngora, Tomás de Iriarte, José Zorrilla, and Federico García Lorca. Quevedo famously described love as “burning ice and cold fire.”
Literary Devices
These are expressive techniques that deviate from the literal meaning for aesthetic purposes. They fall into grammatical, semantic, and phonic categories.
Grammatical Devices
- Epithet: An adjective denoting a quality inherent in the noun.
- Polysyndeton: Repetition of the same conjunction, creating a sense of accumulation and a slow pace.
- Asyndeton: Omission of conjunctions, creating a more fluid expression and a sense of speed.
- Anaphora: Repetition of a word or phrase at the beginning of successive verses.
- Parallelism: Repetition of similar syntactic structures.
- Hyperbaton: Alteration of the normal syntactic order.
Semantic Devices
- Metaphor: Applying a word or phrase to something to which it is not literally applicable.
- Metonymy: Substituting a word with another closely related word (e.g., “the hoary head” for an old person).
- Synecdoche: Substituting a part for the whole or vice versa (a type of metonymy).
- Simile: Comparing two things using “like” or “as.”
- Irony: Expressing the opposite of what is meant.
- Antithesis: Contrasting two words, ideas, or expressions.
Phonic Devices
- Alliteration: Repetition of a sound or sounds.
- Paronomasia: Using words that are phonetically similar.
Other Literary Devices
- Allegory: A sustained metaphor.
- Personification: Giving human qualities to nonhuman things.
- Oxymoron: Combining contradictory terms.
- Paradox: A seemingly absurd or self-contradictory statement.
- Rhetorical Question: A question asked for effect, not requiring an answer.
- Synesthesia: Mixing different sensory experiences.
- Hyperbole: Exaggeration.
- Epanadiplosis: Beginning and ending a verse with the same words.
- Anadiplosis: Starting a verse with the word that ended the previous one.
- Chiasmus: Repeating and reversing the order of two elements in successive verses.