Poetic Castles in Spain

Poetic Castles in Spain
Author: Diego Saglia
Publisher: BRILL
Total Pages: 356
Release: 2021-12-28
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 9004486739

British culture of the Romantic period is distinguished by a protracted and varied interest in things Spanish. The climax in the publication of fictional, and especially poetical, narratives on Spain corresponds with the intense phase of Anglo-Iberian exchanges delimited by the Peninsular War (1808-14), on the one hand, and the Spanish experiment of a constitutional monarchy that lasted from 1820 until 1823, on the other. Although current scholarship has uncovered and reconstructed several foreign maps of British Romanticism - from the Orient to the South Seas - exotic European geographies have not received much attention. Spain, in particular, is one of the most neglected of these 'imaginary' Romantic geographies, even if between the 1800s and the 1820s, and beyond, it was a site of wars and invasions, the object of foreign economic interests relating to its American colonies, and a geopolitical area crucial to the European balance designed by the post-Waterloo Vienna settlement. This study considers the various ways in which Spain figured in Romantic narrative verse, recovering the discursive materials employed in fictional representation, and assessing the relevance of this activity in the context of the dominant themes and preoccupations in contemporary British culture. The texts examined here include medievalizing and chivalric fictions, Orientalist adventures set in Islamic Granada, and modern-day tales of the anti-Napoleonic campaign in the Peninsula. Recovering some of the outstanding works and issues elaborated by British Romanticism through the cultural geography of Spain, this study shows that the Iberian country was an inexhaustible source of imaginative materials for British culture at a time when its imperial boundaries were expanding and its geopolitical influence was increasing in Europe and overseas.

Medieval Spain

Medieval Spain
Author: R. Collins
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 292
Release: 2002-07-30
Genre: History
ISBN: 1403919771

This volume of essays contains contributions from a very wide range of British, American and Spanish scholars. Its primary concern is the relationships between the various ethnic, cultural, regional and religious communities that co-existed in the Iberian peninsula in the later Middle Ages. Conflicts and mutual interactions between them are here explored in a range of both historical and literary studies, to expose something of the rich diversity of the cultural life of later medieval Spain.

Felicia Hemans

Felicia Hemans
Author: N. Sweet
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 266
Release: 2016-02-02
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 0230389562

This collection of twelve specially commissioned essays, the first to focus on the work of Felicia Hemans, includes new work from important critics in the field - Isobel Armstrong, Stephen Behrendt, Gary Kelly, Susan Wolfson - as well as contributions from emerging scholars. Offering close readings of Heman's poetry, new research on her reception, and analyses of her cultural significance, the collection contributes substantially to our understanding of Hemans and to current debates about romanticism, feminism, canonization, and the relations between gender, culture, and poetry.

Les Aventures Du Dernier Abencérage (English Edition)

Les Aventures Du Dernier Abencérage (English Edition)
Author: Francois-René de Chateaubriand
Publisher:
Total Pages: 76
Release: 2015-11-09
Genre:
ISBN: 9781519173355

The Last of the Abencerrajes - François-René de Chateaubriand. A translation into English by A. S. Kline. Illustrated with Lithographs by Francisco Javier Parcerisa. Chateaubriand's tale of a great love thwarted by religion and destiny, is set in 15th century Spain, and centres on the last of the Moorish tribe of the Abencerrages who, legend has it, held high position in the kingdom of Granada. The city was the last to be governed by the Moors, and its surrender to Ferdinand and Isabella, in 1492, by Muhammad XII (Boabdil) marked the end of the Reconquista and the final expulsion of the Moors from Spain. The idea of a doomed relationship between a Christian and a Muslim protagonist appears in a number of earlier works in Europe, for example the 12th or 13th century French chantefable of Aucassin and Nicolette, while the theme of lovers separated by fate, exemplified by Romeo and Juliet or the historical 12th century figures of Abélarde and Héloïse, had particular appeal for Chateaubriand, who gives us variations of the idea in his American novellas Atala and René. A particular strength of this story of Granada, besides the charm of its telling and the beauty of its setting, is Chateaubriand's ability to give equal weight and sympathy to two diverse cultures, while himself believing in the ultimate superiority of the Christian faith. This exaltation of human virtues above particular time and circumstance is one of Chateaubriand's most endearing characteristics. This and other texts available from Poetry in Translation (www.poetryintranslation.com).