Spanish Literature of the 14th and 15th Centuries: A Comprehensive Overview
Spanish Literature of the 14th and 15th Centuries
Introduction
This document provides an overview of various aspects of Spanish literature during the 14th and 15th centuries, encompassing diverse genres and influential authors.
Parts of Speech
Noun
- Common / Proper
- Concrete / Abstract
- Individual / Collective
- Countable / Uncountable
- Singular / Plural
- Masculine / Feminine
Article
- Determiner / Noun
- Masculine / Feminine
- Singular / Plural
Adjective
- Determiner / Adjective (Specific / Explanatory)
- Variable / Invariable
Adjective Determiners and Pronouns
- Personal, Possessive, Demonstrative, Indefinite
- Numeral, Relative, Interrogative, Exclamatory
- Person, Gender, Number
Other Parts of Speech
- Pronoun
- Verb
- Adverb
- Preposition
- Conjunction
Literary Text Analysis
- Summary
- Theme
- Meter
- Rhyme
- Syllable
- Stanza
- Literary Figures
Popular Castilian Lyrics
Singer
- Simple and natural expression of lyricism.
- Beauty and density.
- Irregular metric full of love.
Carol
- Opening lines that form the refrain.
- A movement of 4 lines and 2 or more lines of liaison.
- One rhyme with the moving verse and another, called the vuelta, with the refrain.
Romance
- One of the most appreciated literary demonstrations.
- Oral transmission of Spanish folk poetry.
- First centuries: 14th and 15th.
- Classes:
- History: King Rodrigo, Infants of Lara, El Cid…
- Border: Moorish kingdom against the kingdom of Granada.
- Carolingian or Breton theme: Roland, Charlemagne…
- Romantic and lyrical: Sentimental, loving subject…
Courtly or Provençal-Troubadour Poetry
- Short lines and themes of love.
Italian Allegorical Poetry (Dante)
- Long poems that address high issues and develop them in a solemn style, sometimes in ballads and sometimes in arte mayor.
Marqués de Santillana (15th Century)
Classification of his work:
- Poetry of Provençal influence: Serranillas, poems in short verses and light rhythm.
- Poetry of Italian influence: The Hell of Lovers.
- Didactic moral poetry: Proverbs and moral judgments inspired by the classics.
Juan de Mena
- Contemporary writer, his most important work is Labyrinth of Fortune, also called The Three Hundred.
- Follows the Dantean tradition of allegorical poetry.
- With cultured language and great expressive strength, it develops the idea of the influence of fortune in the lives of men.
Dances of Death
- A skeleton summons men, without distinction of hierarchy or social class, to remind mortals of their condition and invite them to dance a macabre dance.
Jorge Manrique (15th Century)
- Composed 50 compositions grouped into blocks:
- Love poetry: Less cultivated style, stilted and artificial. Some influences of Petrarch and the Italian Renaissance aesthetics are noticeable.
- Couplets for the Death of his Father: He wrote these verses from the pain, resignation, and sincere emotion that the death of his father caused him.
Coplas for the Death of his Father: Themes
- Fugacity of life
- Life as a river
- Terrestrial life and celestial life as a path
- Ubi sunt?: Where are they now?
- Death equates everyone
- Life of fame and honor
Amadis of Gaul
- 14th century. Author unknown, it was taken up and completed by Rodríguez de Montalvo.
- Elegant language. Lyricism stands out.
- Idealization of love and its protagonists.
- Wonderful episodes are interwoven.
Sentimental Novel
- Idealistic subgenre of narrative that triumphs in Spain during the 15th and 16th centuries.
- Predominant sentimental passions of the characters and features:
- Love professed as adoration for the beloved that tends to become a tormented passion.
- The lady is presented as a being full of beauty and virtue.
- Ornate and rhetorical language, full of antitheses, paradoxes, metaphors…
- Loves, often unrequited, usually have a tragic end.
Celestina
Characters:
- Calisto: Part of the rich urban nobility. Lacking cultural, social, or military occupation, he lives viciously and is driven by his passion. He lacks scruples and resorts to bribery and the help of the procuress to achieve his goals.
- Melibea: From a rich and noble family. Loved and elusive at first, she rejects Calisto’s love, but when she falls, she is blindly passionate. She makes her own decisions and can be cunning. Her final decision of suicide redeems her as the heroine of love.
- Pleberio and Alisa: Melibea’s parents. Subjected to the conventions of the class to which they belong, they worry about money and material issues.
- Celestina: Former prostitute, now a procuress, sorceress, and ruler of the brothel, where Areúsa and Elicia work. She is skillful, cunning, and aware of people’s weaknesses; hypocritical and blinded by greed that leads her to death. She is the central character.
- Pármeno and Sempronio: Calisto’s servants. They are violent and ambitious. They join the procuress to profit from Calisto’s passion.
- Elicia and Areúsa: Prostitutes and Pármeno and Sempronio’s girlfriends. Greed and the desire to satisfy their appetites guide them.
Language:
Callisto and melibea: worship and bombastic, frequent inclusion cn d Latinisms and long sentences and complex to use quotes from d classical authors and historical references. of celestite and ls servants popular, full d liveliness and dynamism, popular terms, colloquialisms, jokes and insults, short phrases, filled d colorful and support their arguments on proverbs and sentences dl lore.