Valle-Inclan As Poet
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/ VALLE-INCLAN AS POET (VOLUMES I AND II) VALLE-INCLAIi AS POET VOLUME I Dissertation Presented in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Doctor of Philosophy in the Graduate School of The Ohio State University Gy \V ,AilL Catherine Mjrfry B orelli, 3.A., M.A. The Ohio State University 19% Approved' Adviser D ep artm en t Romance Languages (S p a n is h ) i ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This dissertation was prepared under the direction of Professor Stephen Gilman. I would like to thank Professor Gilman very sincerely for his help and guidance. I would also like to express my sincere thanks to Professor Claude E. Anibal for the help he gave me after Professor Gilman left this University. 1 TABLE OF CONTENTS 1 Introduction...................................... 2 > ► ► Chapter Is VALLE INCLAN'S AESTHETIC PRINCIPLES . .13 (La Lampara Maravillosa) I Chapter 2; TRADITION IN POETRY.................... 62 * (Aromas de Leyenda) ' Chapter 3s MYSTICISM AND AUTOBIOGRAPHY........... 137 I (El Pasajero) I 0 _ Chapter ^s VALLE INCLAN AND THE ESPERPENTO .... 218 (La Pipa de Kif) Conclusion..................................... 298 Appendix Is Claves Liricas ...................... 306 Appendix 2s Valle Inclan's Verse Plays ........... 370 Appendix 3s Poetic Fragments in Valle Inclan's Prose Works . 407 Bibliography 429 2 INTRODUCTION This study is an analysis of the poetry of the Spanish writer Ramon Marfa del Valle Inclan. The prose works of the same author attracted the attention of critics from the moment of their publication, at the beginning of the present century, and although there does not exist to date any monograph dedicated to the whole production of Valle Inclan, it may be said that the importance of his novels and plays has been sufficiently indicated by a number of critics. Valle Inclan's poetic works, on the other hand, have met with a certain indifference, especially at the hands of his own fellow-writers. Even those who have compiled anthologies of modern Spanish poetry have only at a late date become aware of the poetic presence of Valle Inclan, and now that biographers, critics and builders of anthologies are beginning to give the poetic work of this eminent writer the place it deserves, his poetry would 3 seem, in our opinion, to merit closer examination. For this reason we have undertaken to present here an analysis of the poetic production of Valle Inclan. • «»••••• Don Ramon Mar£a del Valle Inclan was born in 1366 and died in 1936. Those familiar with the literature of Europe, especially in France and Spain, know how many facts of cultural importance are contained within those two dates. In France, the violent reaction against positivist realism brought about the movement that took the name of Symbolism, and French culture, which at that time held the key position in the general picture of European culture, was concentrated around the names of writers and poets such as Baudelaire, Verlaine, Rimbaud, Mallarme. At the same time, and even beyond the confines of France, poets of the preceding and opposing school (namely Parnassianism) such as Heredia and Leconte de Lisle, continued to be read. Parnassianism, which was a tendency rather than a 4 real school, is close to Realism, inasmuch as its poetry was expressed in images and musical verse. Jasinski in his Histoire de la litterature francaise (1) says: ...le groupe, dans son ensemble, tend \ la synthase de 1'esprit positiviste et de 1'esprit "artiste1*. II reagit contre le lyrisme personnel, surtout celui de Lamartine et de Musset. II veut une poesie savante, riche de substance, ennoblie par l'harmonie plastique et la perfection de la facture. Telle est 1*orientation maitresse, le commun ideal. On peut, sans contredire aux faits. parler de l'ecole parnassienne. (2) The subsequent Symbolist poetry was entrusted more to suggestion and evocation, and in order to call up poetic visions to the reader, it made use - so said its poets - of symbols. This school had idealistic and mystical aspects, which Sir Cecil Bowra explains clearly as follows: Against this scientific Realism the Symbolists protested, and their protest was mystical in that it was made on behalf of an ideal world which was, in their judgment, more real than that of 5 the senses. It was not in any strict sense Christian. It is true that Verlaine had his days of sinqple unquestioning belief, that Baudelaire*s diabolism was an inverted form of Catholicism, that Mallarme derived much of his imaginative ritual from the ceremonies of the Church. The mystical character of Symbolism was less definitely Christian than any of these manifestations. It was a religion of Ideal Beauty, of *le Beau* and *l*Ideal*. This may be seen in Baudelaire*s belief in that ideal beauty which he contrasted so poignantly with his own life, in Verlaine*s attempt to write on parallel lines of soul and body, in the oracular and enigmatic utterances of Mallarml. For Baudelaire the Ideal and the Beautiful gave force and purpose to his tortured and disordered soul; for Verlaine it justified the search for forbidden pleasure; for Mallarme it was all that mattered. The fabric of their Christian beliefs had been mutilated or undermined, and feeling a need for a gospel to take its place, they found in the Beautiful something which unified their activities and gave a goal to their work. To this belief they clung with a conviction which can only be called mystical because of its intensity, its irrationality, its disregard for other beliefs and its reliance on a world beyond the senses. Symbolism, then, was a mystical form of Aestheticism. (3) Poetic currents of the same character and patterned more or less on the French mould arose a little everywhere in Europe, and therefore also in Spain. The poetic school which inflamed the hearts of Spaniards at the time of Valle Inclan's youth was called Modernism and had as its leader the Nicaraguan poet, Ruben Darfo. Valbuena Prat in his history of Spanish literature (4>) presents Modernism thus: Como reaccion frente al realisrao de un lado, y como estilizacion a la vez de las corrientes romanticas, que no habian desaparecido, en lo esencial, a traves de la segunda raitad del siglo XIX, se forma un estilo, refinado, exquisito, virtuoso de la forma, y que, ya revistiendo formas de simbolismo o ambientes de miniatura costumbrista, encierra una emocion quintaesenciada. A diferencia del descuido exterior de la escuela realista, el modernismo posee el culto de la forma, el sentido mas estricto del verso y de la estrofa en poesfa, y del detalle narrativo y el recortado encuadre de la accion en la novela. (5) This definition seems to show clearly enough what were the ideals and realizations of the poet Ruben Dario and 7 of most of his followers* They sought to express beautiful inspiration in poetry, with beautiful forms and beautiful verses. They drew their inspiration in great part from what came to them from the rest of Europe, and particularly from France* Without making precise distinctions, they somewhat indiscriminately took as their models either the Parnassian poets or the Symbolists. Pedro Salinas in his volume Llteratura Esoanola Siglo XX says* Ruben Dario se acerca a todas las formas de la lfrica europea del siglo XX, desde el romanticismo al decadentismo* (6) In the chapter from which we have drawn the above-quoted passage, Salinas also discusses a phenomenon that assumed capital importance in the history of Spanish culture: the Generation of 93* The historical facts which led in 1893 to the reduction of the Spanish colonial empire had also deep spiritual repercussions on territorial Spain. Thus we find certain characteristics common to the Spanish thinkers of that time, to the extent that a certain group of writers earned the title of Generation of 93. In the following words, Azorfn has described this generation, to which he himself gave the name and to which he belongs: La generacion del 1893 ama los viejos pueblos y el paisaje, intenta resucitar los poetas primitivos (Berceo, Juan Ruiz, Santillana); da aire al fervor por el Greco ya iniciado en Cataluna, y publica, dedicado al pintor cretense, el numero unico de un periodico: Mercurio; rehabilita a Gongora... se declara romantica en el banquete ofrecido a Pfo Baroja, con motivo de su novela Camino de perfeccion; siente entusiasmo por Larra... se esfuerza en fin, en acercarse a la realidad y en desarticular el idioma, en agudizarlo, en aportar a el viejas palabras, plasticas palabras, con objeto de aprisionar menuda y fuertemente esa realidad. La generacion del 93, en suma, ha tenido todo esoj y la curiosidad mental de lo extranjero y el espectaculo del desastre - fracaso de toda la polftica espanola - han avivado su sensibilidad y han puesto en ella una variante que antes no habfa en Espana. (7) As can be seen from the two passages cited above, Modernism and the Generation of 98 are two currents 9 that are contemporaneous but of different origin and of different nature. Pedro Salinas explains in his work already quoted above that the Generation of 93 lived for a certain time alongside Modernism: ...los aliados temporales, modern!smo y la generacion del 93, rompieron en natural obediencia a sus distintas razones de ser. (3) Valle Inclan lived precisely in that period. He began as a writer of stories, then in the course of a few years of literary experience he acquired mastery of the art of narration. Between 1902 and 1905 he composed the Memorias del Marques de Bradom£n. sub divided into four Sonatas, thus establishing himself as a novelist. This work still has great importance in the history of Spanish letters, because it is justly considered one of the best examples of Modernistic prose.