You are right, such a day as Luis de Góngora passed away today, specifically the May 23, 1627. It was one of the most important poets and playwrights of our Spanish Golden AgeHe and known are the "disputes" that he always had with one of his professional colleagues, another great writer, Francisco de Quevedo. And if not, judge for yourself:
Against Don Luis de Góngora and his poetry (Quevedo's attack on Góngora, made into poetry)
This cyclops, not Sicilian,
of the microcosm yes, last orb;
this antipode face, whose hemisphere
zone divided into Italian term;
this living circle in every plane;
this that, being only zero,
multiplies and part by whole
every good Venetian abbot;
the miniature yes, but blind vult;
the bearded chink of manes;
this peak of vice and insult;
this one, in whom today farts are mermaids,
this is the ass, in Gongora and in worship,
that a bujarrón hardly knew him.
La Gongora's answer, it would not be long in coming:
Spanish Anacreon, there is no one to stop you.
Do not say with great courtesy,
That since your feet are of elegy,
That your softness is made of rice
Will you not imitate the Terentian Lope,
Than to Bellerophon every day.
On clogs of comic poetry
He wears spurs, and gives him a gallop?
With special care your cravings
They say they want to translate into Greek
Your eyes not having looked at it.
Lend them a while to my blind eye,
Because to light I brought out certain lazy verses,
And you will understand any gregüesco later.
Quevedo fights back:
I will spread my works with bacon
Why don't you bite me, Gongorilla,
Dog of the mills of Castile,
A scholar in jibes, like a boy on the way.
Hardly a man, an Indian priest,
That you learned without christus the primer;
Chocarrero of Córdoba and Seville,
And in court, jester to the divine.
Why do you censor the Greek language
being only rabbi of the Jewess,
thing that your nose still does not deny?
Do not write more verses, for my life;
Even though the scribes stick to you,
For having rebellion as executioner.
Y Gongora ends:
To Don Francisco de Quevedo
A certain poet, in a pilgrim way
how devout, she got into rosemary,
with whom every barber could do well
wash the most wounded discipline.
It was his blessed cape,
as hers, of a beautiful leather,
his staff helm of the most vixen
bajel, that from the Cecina Lighthouse
to Toast, without making water, sail.
This without landre surrendering Roque,
of a justly vain venera,
that set in gold, holy insignia, madness,
He walks to San Trago, where he arrives:
that both the lame and the healthy walk.
Brief summary about his life
- Gongora I study law at the University of Salamanca.
- It was early his literary vocation.
- Began his ecclesiastical career but his taste for the game, which caused great economic losses.
- He had relationship with the Court, both in Valladolid and Madrid, where he finally settled in 1617.
- He came to enjoy in life huge fame and surrounds himself with great writers of the time.
- It was royal chaplain of Philip III.
- In his last years of life their ties and political support weakened, which is reflected in his literary work with a certain disappointed touch.
Literary work
Of his literary work, the following stand out above all:
- The Fable of Polyphemus and Galatea: relates the mythological and sick love of the Cyclops Polyphemus for the nymph Galatea.
- The Solitudes, where the story of a shipwrecked young man is told, taken in by some goatherds and fishermen. Although Góngora wanted to write a total of 4 solitudes, the poem was finally left with only two.
- The Sonnets, which would deal with various topics such as love, the "carpe diem", the praise of well-known people, moral issues and evocations of landscapes. Although in principle almost all of them are written in a serious tone, there are some that he wrote in a burlesque tone, especially those dedicated to other authors of the time, among them those previously seen towards the figure of Quevedo.
Phrases and quotes by Luis de Góngora
And to end this article dedicated to one of our most baroque authors, we leave you with some of the phrases and quotes that came out of his mouth or pen ... Enjoy them!
- "The greatest prosecutor of my works is me."
- "When I cover the mountains with white snow in January, let me have the brazier full of acorns and chestnuts, and let me know the sweet lies of the king who raged, and let the people laugh."
- "Life is a wounded deer that arrows give it wings."
- "The hours that filing are the days that gnawing are the years."
- “The words, wax; the steel works ”.
- "Steps of a pilgrim are, wanderer, how many sweet muse verses dictated to me in confused solitude, some lost, others inspired."
- "Ill forgive you the hours."
- "Come on me hot ...".