Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 14.djvu/230

 SPAIN

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SPAIN

Alberto Lista

translating Dante. Francisco Imperial, a scion of a Genoese family settled in Spain, did much to spread the Dantesque evangel. A friend of Villena and, like him, a lover of Latin antiquity — though he read no Latin himself, he was a patron of those who did — and a venerator of the great Italian poets, whom he imitated, was the Marques de Santillana, Inigo L6pez de Mendoza (1398- 145S). He was the first to write in Spanish sonnets copying the Italian structure: in this respect his ex- ample was not fol- lowed. Not onlj' did he allegorize in verse less tedious than that of most contemporaries, but he showed an unwonted eclecti- cism iDy imitating the popular songs of the mountains and pilstoral folk. His interest in the literature of the people is avouched also by a collection of their rhymed proverbs which he made. Not the least ad- miralale of his productions is a little prose letter, "Carta al condestable de Portugal", in which he pro- vided the first account of the history of Spanish litera- ture ever committed to wTiting. Another luminarj- of the age was Juan de Mena (1411-56), the royal historiographer, to whom we are indebted especially for the " Laberinto ", in which he not only indulged his allegorizing propensities but also makes obvious his devotion to the ancient Spanish Latin poet Lucan. At times Mena soars to real poetic heights.

The ine\itableness of death had engaged the atten- tion of the plastic and pictorial artist and the liltcra- teur to no slight extent during the later Middle Ages: the French " Danse Macabre" shows what a hold this melancholy idea had taken upon thinking minds. One of the most finished examples of the literary treat- ment of the subject is the Spanish "Danza de la muerte", which is of the early fifteenth century. It surpasses in poetic vigour the French model which it is said to have followed. A not unworthy historian is Fernan Perez de Guzmdn, author of the "Mar de historias", who evinces no mean power as a portrayer of character in his " Generaciones y semblanzas", in which he describes famous personages of his time. The prose satire in all its virulence is represented by the "Corbacho" of the archpriest of Talavera, Marti- nez de Toledo (died about 1470), an invective upon womankind. Two noteworthy satires of the second half of the century are the anonymous "Coplas del provincial" and "Coplas de Mingo Revulgo", setting forth administrative vices and the WTongs done to the people at large. The renascence of the Spanish drama is now foreshadowed in some pieces of G6mez M_an- rique, whose nephew, Jorge Manrique (1440-78), gained enduring fame by his swe*t and mournful "Coplas" on the death of his father, which Longfel- low has skilfully rendered into English verse. An event of transcendent importance throughoiit the civiUzed world wius the establishment at this time of the printing-pre.ss; it was set up in Spain in 1474.

Of all lanils Spain has the richest sujiply of ballads (romances); no fewer than 2000 are |)riiited by Durdn in his " Romancero general". We have reason to sup- pose that Ihcy began to be written in the fourteenth century, liut i\w earliest extant seem to date from the fifteenth century. The great majority, however, are

of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. While the earlier among them are anonymous, the later ones are often by well-known writers and are clearly arti- ficial in character. Towards the end of the century there appeared in print the first great modern novel, the " Amadis de Gaula", which soon begot many other novels of chivalry like unto itself, recounting the ex- ploits of other Amadises, of Palmerins, etc. The vogue of the progeny of the first "Amadis" — which certainl}' existed in a more primitive form back in the fourteenth century and has been claimed, against the greater likelihood, for Portuguese literature — became a veritable plague, reaching down into the opening of the seventeenth century, when the success of the "Don Quixote" gave it its death stroke. Over against the idealism of the novels of chivalry there stands already, at the close of the fifteenth century, the crass realism of the "Celestina" (or Tragicome- dia de Calisto y Melibea), a novel of illicit love to which the author, presumably Fernando de Rojas, gave a somewhat dramatic form. The work influ- enced later dramatic product ion and has decided graces of style. With the "Eglogas" of Juan del Encina (about 1469-1533), the old sacred drama, already timidly attempted by G6mez de Manrique, reappears without showing any clear advance over the ancient "Auto de los reyes magos". Encina also essayed the farce.

Soon after the dawn of the sixteenth century there commences the most glorious period in Spain's polit- ical history, that represented by the expansion of her foreign dominion during the reigns of Isabella and Ferdinand, Charles V, and Philip II. Wealth flowed in from the transatlantic colonies and provided the means for developing the arts on a grandiose scale. The literary art keeps pace with the others, and there now ensues what the Spaniards call the siglo de oro, the Golden Age of their literature, which extends even through the seventeenth century despite the political, social, and economic decay which that cen- tury so obviously shows. A dependence upon Italy and its Renaissance literary methods manifests itself in practically every form of literary composition. Italian verse-forms (the hendecasylla- ble, the octave, the sonnet ,theca?!Zo«e, etc.) are natural- ized definitively by Juan Boscdn (about 1490-1542) and Garcilaso de la Vega (1503-36), who inaugurate an Italianizing lyric movement, which triumphs over all opposition. After them the great poets use the im- ported Italian measures no less frequent Ij- than the native ones. Con- temporarj' Italian- ates are the Portu- guese Sii de Miranda, Cetina, Acuna, and the versa- tile Hurtado de Mendoza; of but little effect was the reactionary movement of Castillejo and Silvestre. What the nascent drama of Spain in the sixteenth century owes to stimulus from the Italian drama has not vet been made out fully. Encina had been in Italy; Torres Naharro (died about 1530) published his "Propaladia", a collection of dramat ic ineccs.at Naples (then an .-^ragonese t'ourt), in 1517. With him the punctilio, or jioint of honour, is already an important dramatic moUJ. In Lope de Rueda (about 1510-65)