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Special Focus Introduction: Bodies, Transnationalism And Affect In Recent Hispanic Poetry, Enrique Álvarez

Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature

Introduction to special focus section: Bodies, Transnationalism and Affect in Recent Hispanic Poetry.

Memorials, Shrines And Umbrellas In The Rain: Poetry And 11-M, Jill Robbins

Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature

This project examines the representations in recent Spanish poetry of violence, solidarity, and memory, as these intersect with ethnic, linguistic and religious otherness, globalization, communication technology, and nationalisms. The lens through which the analysis is refracted is the poetic response to the Islamist terrorist bombings of working-class commuter trains in Madrid on March 11, 2004 (known in Spain as 11-M). This event, which occurred days before national elections, exposed the contradictory cultural forces that underlie notions of the national identity, economic transformation, the role of the media, and the social contract in Spain today. This became apparent in the massive …

Cernuda In Current Spanish Poetry, Salvador J. Fajardo

Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature

The poet Luis Cernuda (Spain, 1902-Mexico, 1963) has left his mark on much of the poetry written in Spain since the sixties. First rediscovered in the Peninsula in the late fifties and early sixties by, among others, Francisco Brines, José Angel Valente, and Jaime Gil de Biedma, his influence became pervasive both through the work of these poets, and, through the reading of Cernuda’s poetry itself, available since 1975 in Harris and Maristany edition. Referring in particular to Biedma, whose impact on younger poets has been significant, this paper examines the presence of Cernuda in certain approaches to language and …

Dismantling Romantic Utopias: María Beneyto's Poetry Between Tradition And Protest , Candelas S. Gala

Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature

Despite the fact that Vicente Aleixandre considered her one of the best young authors of the generation of social poets of the 1950s, María Beneyto's writings have been disregarded by critics. While sharing the social concerns of the other poets of her generation, Beneyto's poetry also reveals the dilemma of the woman author facing a cultural tradition that espouses pre-established models for her conduct and identity patterned mostly in accordance with tenets of Romanticism. Beneyto resorts to those models as projections of herself as she seeks to articulate her own identity as woman and author. The objective of this essay …

Rhythm And Meter In The Early Juan Ramón Jiménez: The Case Of "¡Silencio!" Of Estío, Vialla Hartfield-Méndez

Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature

The literary trajectory of Juan Ramón Jiménez is commonly divided into two periods, though this division is also generally recognized as an oversimplification of a very complex process in which the poet moves from the use of more traditional poetic forms, and a more concrete reference to reality, to the practice of free verse and more metaphysical expressions of man's relationship to his surroundings. "¡Silencio!," the last poem of Estío (1915), was written just prior to Diario de un poeta reciéncasado, the book with which it is considered that Juan Ramón began the second stage of his literary trajectory. …

Intertextuality And Subversion: Poems By Ana Rossetti And Amparo Amorós, Andrew P. Debicki

Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature

In the last two decades, a number of Spanish women poets have written very significant works which use intertextuality to lead their readers into new perspectives and attitudes toward literary and social conventions. By examining two texts by Rossetti and Amorós that use intertexts to undermine, respectively, traditional "carpe diem" poetry and sexually allusive verse of different kinds, the article suggests that they reflect new, post-modern literary currents.

Fifty Years Of Contemporary Spanish Poetry (1939-1989), José Olivio Jiménez

Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature

Fifty Years of Contemporary Spanish Poetry (1939-1989)

Introduction: Critical Perspectives On Contemporary Spanish Poetry, Andrew P. Debicki

Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature

Introduction to the special issue

Language And Consciousness In The Poetry Of The "Novisimos": Guillermo Carnero's Latest Poetry, Ignacio-Javier López

Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature

Guillermo Carnero's latest book of poetry, Divisibilidad indefinida, has recently appeared in Spain. In it, the reader witnesses, on the one hand, the reaffirmation of the poetic of the "novisimos": a self-conscious use of language, the presence of "culturalism," a distancing of language, a doubling of the poetic persona. On the other hand, the book reveals an effort to encompass a more complete perspective of poetic reality. The combative attitude of the first decade of the "novisimos" having been left behind, Carnero now develops his poetry in Divisibilidad indefinida by bringing it nearer to human life, although without renouncing …

Recent Poetry And The Essential Word, Biruté Ciplijauskaité

Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature

Postmodern poetry resists classification in tight compartments. After the last artificially-named group of the novisimos in the 60s, the evolution of poetry in Spain has followed different and at times divergent paths. The novisimos had reacted against "social" poetry, denouncing its lack of attention to artistry, almost prosaic quality, subservience to theme, and produced elaborate creations with an emphasis on form and the exquisite and more hermetic word and subject. Obeying the law of corsi e ricorsi, there was a certain return in the 80s to simpler expression which, however, does not pretend to be that of the "man …

A Reconsideration Of Two Spanish Women Poets: Angela Figuera And Francisca Aguirre, John C. Wilcox

Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature

In the last decade, poetry written by women in Spain experienced a "boom," as one close observer of the scene has noted, with the result that young women poets on the Peninsula have begun to receive the attention they merit. It is therefore an opportune moment to turn our critical attention toward the poetry written by women earlier in the twentieth century.

Angela Figuera (1902-1984) and Francisca Aguirre (b. 1930), two "uncanonized" mid-twentieth century Spanish poets, are presented here as challenging the androcentric culture of their time. Figuera critiques the male-dominated poetic canon as she develops a gynocentric poetics; poems …

Towards A Poetry Of Silence: Stéphane Mallarmé And Juan Ramón Jiménez, Mervyn Coke-Enguídanos

Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature

In an era of apparent dissolution, "la Obra" of Juan Ramón Jiménez, like "l'Oeuvre" of Stéphane Mallarmé, has for its goal the attainment of timelessness. In both poets, the concept of absolute Time—the timelessness of eternal Time—is yoked with the ideal of silence. But this is no ordinary silence, and certainly not the kind that results from inadequacy of expression. It is the silence of perfection, the expression of the ineffable: pure Poetry. Since the poetic language is the silent language of thought, both Mallarmé and Juan Ramón seek to convey the pure idea. In so doing, both must stringently …

Construction And Deconstruction: The Theme Of Fleetingness In Poems By Juan Ramón Jiménez, And Pedro Salinas, Andrew P. Debicki

Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature

Both Juan Ramón Jiménez and Salinas reveal in their poems a striving to capture the essences of things, continuing in this quest a tradition coming to them from symbolist poetry. By examining several poems written by them, however, we discover a basic difference in their way of embodying this striving. Juan Ramón, concerned with the perfection of form, remains within a logocentric tradition in which the poem attempts to embody its meanings objectively; Salinas, on the other hand, writes poems the meanings of which evolve with successive readings and reflect the theme of reality's fleetingness. A close analysis of the …

Juan Ramón Jiménez And Nietzsche, John P. Devlin

Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature

The young Juan Ramón Jiménez shared the enthusiasm for the writings of Nietzsche prevalent among his contemporaries. More significant are the interest in and affinity with Nietzsche which persisted into the poet's maturity. Jiménez found in Nietzsche not only a man of ideas but a poet who claimed to be a potent spiritual force. Both writers held that the modern age could recover a sense of spiritual integrity through the will of the individual to live and interpret human existence as an aesthetic phenomenon. Nietzsche's views on the nature of art and the role of the artist helped to sustain …

An Inquiry Into Juan Ramon's Interest In Walter Pater, John C. Wilcox

Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature

The evidence for Juan Ramon's interest in Pater, which began around 1920 and was still active twenty years later, is discussed in this paper. Pater's view of death and dying and his attitude toward the decadent persona are described in so far as they indicate the spiritual affinity that exists between him and Juan Ramón. Pater's aesthetic idealism, and the presence of similar ideals in Juan Ramon's own work are then examined. The second part of the paper concentrates on the great interest Juan Ramón took in Pater's evocation of the Mona Lisa. The potential impact of the aesthetic idealism …