Baudelaire’s Correspondences: Unveiling the Poet’s Aesthetic Creed
Correspondences: Baudelaire’s Aesthetic Creed
Critics agree that “Correspondences” embodies the poet’s aesthetic credo, outlining his artistic principles. This manifesto sets forth the fundamental tenets of symbolism, influencing later French poetry. The sonnet is a pivotal moment in poetry history.
Nature is a “temple” where living pillars murmur sometimes indistinct words; Man approaches it through forests of symbols, which observe him with familiar glances. This concept suggests that nature is
Read MoreJorge Manrique’s ‘Coplas’: Structure, Themes, and Medieval Context
Structure and Themes in Manrique’s ‘Coplas’
Verses I-XII: Abstract Reflections on Death
In this first section, the poem considers death in the abstract. It offers a general and philosophical reflection, noting the speed with which death arrives, always hidden and unexpected, and its equalizing power, as it reaches everyone.
Coplas XIV-XXIV: Death and Historical Figures
This series of stanzas discusses death with specific examples of historical personages of the time. The focus shifts to the death and
Read MoreThe Battle of Maldon: History and Analysis
The Battle of Maldon
The Battle of Maldon recounts the victory of the Danes, possibly under the famous Olaf Tryggvason (956–1000), an illustrious leader of the Vikings and later king of Norway. The events of the poem took place in 991, and the author of the poem apparently did not know the identity of the enemy leader. Moreover, it is thought that the leader of the East Saxon levy was Byrhtnoth, the veteran Ealdorman of Essex, and that the Viking host had sailed up from Ipswich and beached their
Read MoreNeoclassicism in English Literature
Neoclassicism in English Literature (1660-1798)
In England, Neoclassicism flourished roughly between 1660, when the Stuarts returned to the throne, and 1798, the year of the publication of Wordsworth’s Lyrical Ballads. This collection of poems, along with its theoretical preface, is considered to herald the beginning of the Romantic Age. Regarding English literature, the Neoclassical Age is typically divided into three periods:
- The Restoration Age (1660-1700)
- The Augustan Age (1700-1750)
- The Age of
Literary Movements: 18th Century to Romanticism
18th Century Poetry Characteristics
- Imitation of the classics
- Hierarchy of genres
- Rationalism
- Skepticism
- Urbanity, sophistication, and cosmopolitanism
- Preoccupation with the here and now
- Aristocratic taste
- Use of personification and mythological references and figures of Rome and Greece
- Critical and analytical spirit
- The purpose of literature was to instruct through pleasure, thereby uniting aesthetic and didactic purposes
- Greatest virtue in art was a universal significance
- Conversational ease, restraint, and
Humanism in 14th Century Europe
Segle XV l’Humanisme: Female Anthropocentric Vision
It is based in 14th-century Europe. When finding a slow evolution in the arts and ideology, this aesthetic model brought about medieval humanism.
Characteristics:
- Change in the design world.
- We pass from a theocentric universe to an anthropocentric world.
- The universe is at the service of man.
- Reason wins.
- The artist will have Greco-Latin tradition as a model to follow.
Nicolas Lluis Dolwer:
He gives a definition of humanism: “It is nothing but a projection
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