Jeremo Preblago
For three centuries, his literary glory has languished under the vaults of libraries, in the silence of professors' offices, in the peristoles of monasteries...
Only a "new reading" of the French symbolists, Verlaine and Mallarmé, and the "generation of 98" will resurrect his literary work in all its baroque beauty and opulence. Luis de Gongora Argola, also known as the "angel of light", but also as the "angel of darkness".
Unlike the Spain of his time, "where everything happened by chance", Luis de Gongora's life path has a certain schematicity.
Frequent travel
He was born in Córdoba in 1561, and should actually have been called Luis de Argola Gongora. The future poet took his mother's name first - according to some for sonority, while others emphasize a more prosaic reason - his uncle's inheritance. In his hometown, he studied at a Jesuit school and acquired considerable humanistic knowledge. He continued his education at the University of Salamanca, studying theology and law. It seems that during these four years (1576-1580), poetry, theater and bullfights attracted him more than the strict catechism of the Catholic Church, so one of his devoted biographers wrote: "He studied a little, gambled a lot and was in love." Upon returning to his hometown, he accepted the position of prebender (supervisor) of the cathedral in Córdoba, which brought him solid income. And yet, even the priest's robe did not separate him from the theater, parades, Sunday corridas with rich feasts, cheerful company, and the few pious songs he wrote were actually a modest concession to long gambling "vigils".
The call of the prebender required him to travel frequently throughout Spain. Longer stays in Madrid, Valladolid, Salamanca revealed to him the narrowness of his hometown, so he tried in every way to reach the capital. He will move to Madrid in 1617 to occupy a powerful patron, the Duke of Lerma. The latter made him the high post of the king's chaplain, but only when the courtiers convinced him that there was a regulation according to which "all the chaplains of his majesty Philip III must be... insane".
The high position of chaplain, lucrative income, court festivities, poetic fame... seemed to be the fulfillment of the life dreams of the son of a modest nobleman from the province. And they were actually signs of future troubles that "came in waves".
Court, gambling, debts...
With money, the recent prebender didn't manage sensibly even in his native Cordoba, let alone in frivolous Madrid! Serving for honor and name, Gongora got into debt easily. Bills of exchange piled up, debts grew, and his gambling luck failed him, and it's a bit sad to read his correspondence from that time where the great Cordoba begs for financial help, debt relief, a more lucrative position.
His protectors also end tragically. Rodrigo Calderon, Marquis of the Seven Churches ends up on a "wooden zip" to keep his pride alive; the refined gongorista, the Marquis of Viljemediana dies pierced by the "king's swords"; the deposed Count of Lemus is more fortunate - he dies of natural causes. Abandoned and lonely, Gongora is already thinking about returning after five years in the capital ("Find me a job there, because I've had enough of Madrid and the royal court," he wrote to a friend).
But the most difficult trial was yet to come. Gongora's poetic work was questioned.
The Spanish poetry of Gongora's time is still an echo of the battles that were waged for many years by two opposing schools of poetry: one called "folk" and the other called "learned or courtly". Cristoforo de Castillejo and Gregorio Silvestre were the most prominent among the folk poets, and Garcilas and Boscano among the learned poets. Gongora in his early sonnets was closer to "clear" poets:
"The Spaniard in Oran served the king with two spears, and with his heart and soul the African woman served one beautiful one." ("Romance" - sung by N. Milićević)
But sophisticated connoisseurs of poetry will sense the "dark Gongor" already in his first romances:
"Faces with little blood Eyes with many nights."
Sonnets, plays and romances will be written by Gongor with great success until the end of his life, but when in 1609 he publishes "Hymn to the Duke of Lerma", a real war will break out in the poetic field of honor, which culminates three years later, when his "Soloencies" and " Polyphemus and Galatea”. Gongora's clear intention to "at the cost of his work equalize Castilian with perfect and sublime Latin" and the recognition that "sleeping in Spanish, he dreams of Greek" - provoked fierce reactions.
From "prince of light" to "prince of darkness"
Gongora's contemporaries, as if after a "tough dream", found with astonishment that their native Castilian was turning into a foreign language that they could not decipher; the magnificent Lope de Vega and the passionate Quevedo noticed with discomfort that Gongora was creating his own school of poetry, "culturism" or "gongorism"; it was opposed by "conceptism", a school that insisted on clarity and sharpness of spirit above all. The caustic Kevedo sings a sonnet in which he mocks Gongora's language:
"In one day, taught to be the one who longs for Nero-language-inventive will learn easily: Blesak, proud, young, certainly suspecting Innocence, creates, with a harmonious meter."
Critics also spoke up. Gongora's poetic transformation from the "prince of light" to the "prince of darkness" was attributed to the influence of his teacher Herrera, reading Luis Karillo, egocentrism, even mental disorder. They called him a "monster of grammatical vices", and declared "Loneliness" to be a scar that needs to be covered up. In the preface to Gongora's poetry, he wrote in large letters: "Do not approach because he is incomprehensible."
Where did the misunderstanding come from?
The Gongorin dictionary, although rich and varied, is not full of unknown words. Its syntax, when "reduced" to Latin, is understandable. Therefore, his understanding of the mythological world remains, because the "dark Gongora" is not satisfied with just citing ancient myths - he often transforms them:
"My bold thought climbs to the Zenith, clothed in feathers, whose daring flight - if your foam is not called by it - let its down feathers be scattered on all sides, the annals of the wind of airy storage." ("Ikar" - sung by V. Košutić)
Only a few connoisseurs of ancient mythology could penetrate into "Solitudes" and understand the subtle allusions and refined allegories with which Gongora revived the myths of Zeus, Ganymede, Europa, Arion and Vulcan... Gongora's great lyrical endeavor would be covered in silence. The bucolic dream dreamed by Cervantes, the Arcadia dreamed by Lope de Vega were masterfully shaped in Gongora's poems. And now, such and such Gongor needed to be there, in the capital, within reach of the sword, two undisputed arbiters of Spanish literature - Lope de Vega and Quevedo to calmly observe how, with cardinally raised heads, they were patiently reaping the glory of the greatest poet of Philip's "golden age".
Lope de Vega was the first to speak. Once a great admirer of the "clear" Gongora, to whom he once dedicated a sonnet ("Sing, Andalusian swans..."), now his pen is wet with bile: "Oh you, skull of a swan, what do you want to sing on your deathbed..."
Kevedo showed even greater intolerance towards Gongora. Impatience that develops into an almost animalistic hatred, which is not alleviated even by Gongora's death.
Death in Cordoba
Mocked by the "arbiters of Spanish literature", without powerful patrons, misunderstood by readers, Gongora retreated to his homeland before the "serrated horns of Spanish envy", bequeathing his poetic "credo" to future generations.
"As for the honorable, I consider that poetry was honorable to me in two ways; if scholars understand it - and that it is a necessary act to respect the fact that our language, through my efforts, reached the perfection and sublimity of Latin".
But who in Madrid is interested in the sentence of a lonely priest? Madrid, frivolous and smooth, "applauds the comedies of Lope de Vega and plays hide and seek around the Prado."
Córdoba, the saddest city in Andalusia, welcomes its "prodigal son" indifferently. The poet moves into a dilapidated house, with two bars and a large porch, across the street from the monastery of the Bose brothers of the Holy Trinity. From the balcony of his birthplace, Gongora observes an unusual cavalcade of knights, monks, beggars, horsemen, and gypsy women with damp curls. He spends his time reading books, walking around the yard, talking to the barber.
In the morning, on March 23, 1627, he went out on the balcony for a short time. A large bright cloud falls on the nearby Tower of Evil Death. Crossing herself, Gongora lay down again on the bed, covered in orange blossoms. He still has time to fold his hands and pray the "Our Father".
His friends found him already cold: with the wisdom of a Stoic, they concluded that it was unnecessary, after Cervantes' tercet, to say goodbye to Gongora:
"That virtuous friend, a respected man with a brilliant mind, respected and famous above all the poets known in Phoebus."
Lorca "broke the seals" from Gongora's sarcophagus
"To say everything is the secret of a boring man" - Mallarme. Let's add "boring" poetry. With the intuition of a great poet, Gongora felt it. Hence, his lyrics, initially harmless and transparent like crystal, over time - enriched with bold metaphors and surprising turns of phrase - become "hermetic", and he, along with the crown of thorns, which evil-doers and envious people, miscreants and ignorant people weaved around his forehead, from " angel of light", turn into "angel of darkness".
It took three full centuries for another Andalusian, Federico García Lorca, to break the seven seals from his literary "sarcophagus" with his famous essay "Poetic Image in Gongora", and elevate him to the pedestal of "the father of contemporary European lyric".
"Generation 98" - Valja Inklan, Asorin, Baroka, Unamuno and Maesta - which, together with Lorca, built the "forbidden city" of modern Spanish lyricism with its metaphors and symbols, assonances and alliterations, welcomed Gongora's "coronation" with joy.
A master of verse and an unsurpassed architect of song, Gongora is known for his bold use and creation of metaphors, which have only been fully understood and accepted by new generations.
We will mention only a few, as a great example of the combination of logic and poetic freedom:
"Winged Dido" (bee); ""silent stars" (flowers); "sweat of heaven" (rosa); "hours dressed in numbers" (clock); "light wind celebration" (flag); “squeezed crimson” (wine)…
(Sung by V. Košutić)
Bonus video:
