Spanish Literature: Novecentismo, Generation of ’98, and Modernism
Novecentismo
This movement is characteristic of the second decade of the 20th century. The decline of Modernism in Spain was evident by this time, and new literary magazines such as ‘Prometheus’ (1908) proposed a different approach. The most important literature of the date (1914) was the start of a World War and the emergence of the “League of Political Education,” which included Manuel Azaña, Ortega y Gasset, and several others. Novecentists are also called the “Generation of ’14.”
Features:
- Rationalism: Intellectual rigor and clarity of expression.
- Anti-romanticism: Rejects the sentimental and passionate; they prefer a balanced and calm attitude.
- Defense of pure art: Art should be limited to providing aesthetic pleasure and not be a vehicle for religious concerns, political opinions, or emotions.
- Aristocratic: Intellectual literature designed for the elite.
Juan Ramón Jiménez (1881-1956)
Nobel Prize winner in 1956, the poet established three stages in his later years:
Sensitive phase (1898-1915): Marked by the influence of Bécquer, Symbolism, and Modernism. It reflects landscape descriptions, vague feelings, melancholy, and emotional and sentimental memories in poetry. Examples: Sound Isolation, Platero and I, Elejías, etc.
Intellectual age (1916-1936): A period marked by the publication of “Diary of a Recently Married Poet,” which is characterized by free verse, prose poems, and chaotic enumerations. Other examples of the era: Eternity, Poetry, Beauty, Stone and Sky, etc.
Last stage or true (1937-1958): Written during his American exile. It seeks perfection. His beauty and longing for transcendence lead him to identify with God. Examples: Animal Background, God Desired and Desiring, On the Other Side, etc.
Generation of ’98 (Features)
They were a group of writers who, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, strove to intervene in the sanitation of public life, showing the miseries of Spanish society. Azorín, Pío Baroja, and Ramiro de Maeztu formed the “Group of Three.” This generation represents the disaster of Spain after the Treaty of Paris. Other authors include Miguel de Unamuno, Antonio Machado, and Valle-Inclán. Criteria of this generation:
- They are close in age, with the maximum age difference between the oldest and the youngest being 15 years.
- Predilection for Castile.
- They are anticlerical.
- They have similar concerns.
- They take Larra as a teacher.
- They are related through newspapers.
- They are joined by the disaster of ’98.
Common Features Between “98” and Modernism
- They reflect the need for social and artistic regeneration during the deep crisis in Spain. In that sense, the “problem of Spain” is the great underlying theme of ’98.
- They keep a unifying perspective of Spain at that moment. Castile is a symbol of the country.
- They reject the bourgeois class, to which most of them belong. The majority of the writers of ’98 are a perfect example of the crisis of bourgeois consciousness.
- They are totally anti-realistic and anti-positivist in literature and thought; they introduce subjective elements of irrational political and literary ideas.
- Influenced by European philosophical currents of the moment: irrationalism, vitalism, and another influence, “regeneration.”
- They propose individualistic, subjective, and idealistic solutions to a Spanish material problem.
- They maintain a desire to influence public impact in society.
- They claim the test with a taste for the traditional language.
Antonio Machado (1875-1939)
In his poems, there is an evolution from Modernism to the simple search for words and communicating true emotions. His poems suggest but do not explain. His verses are full of symbols such as the traveler (the poet) who runs one way (life), dreams (hope) in the afternoon (the feeling of passing time), spring (the time for love) under the trees, and talks to the sources (the poet’s life).
1) “Solitudes, Galleries, and Other Poems”
Intimate Modernism. It reflects love, the passage of time, awareness of death, and God. It’s a symbolist poetry.
2) “Campos de Castilla”
It is a reflection of the reality of Spain, its people, and its lands. There is a critical attitude that testifies to backwardness, poverty, inequality, and injustice.
His Style: Symbolism. Short phrases and simple structure, abundant and valuable connotative adjectives. He used traditional verses, later popular stanzas, and also the sonnet.