Romances of chivalry were extremely popular in Spain in the first half of the 16th century. Numerous continuations and imitations immediately followed the publication in 1508 of Amadís de Gaula and its sequel Las sergas de Esplandián, 1510. Exact numbers are hard to pin down, but some 60 were published during the 16th century, with most appearing between 1508 and 1550.

The Amadís cycle alone consists of 12 books (e.g., Lisuarte de Grecia, 1514, Amadís de Grecia 1530). Of the many imitations, the best known is the Palmerín cycle (Palmerín de Oliva 1511, Palmerín de Inglaterra 1547 etc.). These and others are mentioned in Don Quixote, with most being condemned to the flames during the famous examination of Don Quixote’s library (Bk I, 6).

Why should romances of chivalry be so popular in Spain in the first half of the 16th century, and what explains their remarkable decline during the second half of that century?

Let’s look at their popularity. Amadís de Gaula, the father of this vast progeny was essentially a medieval work (first mentioned in the 14th century) yet it was avidly read or listened to in the 16th century (i.e. the Renaissance, or Siglo de Oro in Spain).

The romances were more than an escape to some exotic far away land to follow the incredible adventures of equally incredible knights. There was something in the spirit of the medieval chivalric world that was compatible with that of early 16th-century Spain, or in this instance more precisely Castile. Certainly, the chivalric ethos of loyalty to king and religion, its militaristic fervour and its Christian undertone found ready resonance in a country undergoing dynastic changes –the arrival of the Hapsburg house- and new religious challenges –the rise of Protestantism.

The Court.
When Ferdinand and Isabel married in 1474, they joined together the kingdoms of Castile and Aragon, establishing the foundations of the modern state of Spain. They were the last of their respective houses and were succeeded in 1517 by their grandson, Charles, heir to the prestigious Hapsburg throne. Charles, who was educated in Flanders, was also Duke of Burgundy, and was exposed from an early age to the chivalric ideals and fashion practiced in the Court of Burgundy.

Not surprisingly, Charles enjoyed romances of chivalry and the tournaments and jousts associated with that world. He had a particularly favourite book, Belianís de Grecia (pub. 1545), and pestered its author, Jerónimo Fernández, for a sequel. Charles even sought a chivalric method of resolving political disputes when he twice challenged the young king of France to a duel (1528 and 1536). In other words, the royal court of Spain felt at home in the world of chivalry.

Religion.
It so happened, too, that Charles besides being King of Spain also acquired the title of Holy Roman Emperor in 1519, thereby becoming the official defender of Catholicism, which at the time felt itself under attack everywhere: the explosion of Protestantism in Northern Europe, the continuing threat of Islam in the Mediterranean and heresy within Spain itself.

Charles was in all ways a warrior king fighting in France, Italy, North Africa, and his aggressive defence of the Faith was readily understood by Spaniards. Even allowing for periods of convivencia (getting along with each other), the Christians had struggled for centuries against Islam and had only just successfully eliminated it with the conquest of Granada (1492).

The Christian piety of knights-errant and the crusading spirit and conversion episodes of pagans to Christianity in the Spanish romances of chivalry understandably resonated with Spanish readers. After all, mass conversion had taken place following the conquest of Granada, when both Muslims and Jews were either forcibly converted or sent into exile.

And it was now, too, that the Inquisition –introduced into Castile in 1478 to examine heresy within the Catholic fold —started to become increasingly active. (Ironically this growing intolerance took place at the same time that scholarship in both classical and biblical studies were opening Spain up to new ideas, and Spanish literature was embarking on new and unexplored avenues.

Conquest of America and Medieval “Reconquista”:
The affinity between the medieval world and early 16th-century Spain stretched also to the “discovery” of America (Las Indias). With the remarkable tales of the wonders of these new, exotic lands across the seas, the fantastic adventures of daring knights suddenly no longer seemed quite so unlikely.

Also, the conquest of America acquired a similar aura to the medieval reconquest of territories from the Moors. The risk taker and man of action, the adventurer, required for the conquest of America had been forged during the medieval Reconquista. The rewards for the conquistador were similar to those of his medieval predecessor, the reconquistador: land to conquer, people to convert to Christianity, and glory or fame.

The one major difference was that the conquistadors and reconquistadores were real people who also sought wealth whereas the knight-errant of the romances was a fictional creature indifferent to material gain. Bernal Díaz de Castillo, a soldier who took part in the conquest of Mexico, put the conquistador’s objective succinctly: “we came here to serve God and the king and also to get rich” (Elliott 53).

It is Bernal Díaz, too, who provides a striking link between the chivalric world and the experiences which he and his fellow soldiers were sharing. On seeing the Aztec capital Tenochtitlan (now Mexico City) for the first time, they were so amazed by its beauty that it reminded them of “the enchanted things related in the book of Amadís” (Elliott 53). As a generalization, then, the spirit of the medieval Reconquista was alive and well, and continued in the conquest of Las Indias.

Readers of Romances of Chivalry:
Who was it who read these romances of chivalry? In a society where the vast majority was illiterate, the reading public was limited mainly to the nobility, the church, and the professional classes e.g. lawyers, administrators, merchants etc.

An increase in the number of universities -from 6 in 1470 to 33 by the early 17th century- and the impact of the printing press -there were printers in 23 Spanish towns by 1501- were important factors in enlarging readership and expanding the accessibility of the works.

To these educated readers we can add an illiterate public which enjoyed listening to the tales. Cervantes gives an idea of this pastime in Don Quixote, I, 32, where the innkeeper of the inn where Don Quixote is staying describes how there was always someone who knew how to read and how they would all listen fascinated to the feats of their favourite knights. Such scenes, however, would probably not be widespread but limited largely to those villages or inns located near larger towns or on routes between major urban centres, e.g. between Seville and Toledo/Madrid.

Among those who were avid readers of the romances in their youth were famous figures such as the mystic St Teresa of Avila, the energetic reformer and founder of the Order of Discalced Carmelites, St Ignatius of Loyola former soldier and founder of the Jesuits, and Juan Luis Vives, humanist, educator, and one time lecturer at Oxford and tutor to one of the daughters of Henry VIII of England.

Nevertheless, the very popularity of the romances also drew the critical attention of moralists, theologians and humanists. The romances were attacked both for form and content. They were condemned as wicked fabrications with neither head nor tail, and charged with immorality and lies that could mislead readers and plunge them into iniquity. (St Teresa, St Ignatius and Vives were among many who later regretted their youthful enthusiasm for such books.)

Calls were made for their prohibition, but were mostly ignored. In 1531 they were banned from the Indies, evidently with no success because another ban was issued in 1553. An appeal by the Cortes (Parliament) of Castile to the king in 1555 for the complete abolition of romances fell largely on deaf ears.

By now, however, other factors were coming into play that proved far more effective than official bans in the dramatic decline in the number of new romances of chivalry in the second half of the 16th century (reprints of older romances were still common).

At the same time, a few religious romances “a lo divino” (i.e. converted into religious texts, not a difficult task if we think of the expression “church militant” or a religious group such as the Salvation Army, founded 1865) also appeared, but they made no great splash. The last new romance was published in 1602, just three years before Don Quixote: Part I.

Sources:
Eisenberg, D Romances of Chivalry in the Spanish Golden Age Newark, Delaware 1982
Elliott, J.H Imperial Spain 1469-1716 London 1963
Sieber, Harry in Romance: Generic Transformation from Chretien de Troyes to Cervantes eds Brownlee, K and Brownlee M.S Hanover 1985 pp. 203-19
Whitenack, Judith “Don Quixote and the Romances of Chivalry Once Again: Converted Paganos and Enamoured Magas,” in Bulletin of the Cervantes Society of America 13.2 (1993): 61-91

The decline in popularity of romances of chivalry in the second half of the 16th century in Spain is all the more dramatic given their remarkable vogue in the first half. Specific causes are difficult to pinpoint, and their decline was most likely caused by a combination of factors.

Pikes, crossbows and longbows were still effective but as the use of gunpowder improved it began to replace traditional weapons, so that by 1550 firearms had come into general use. Muskets and harquebuses were better able to penetrate protective armour and at greater distances thereby making heroic hand to hand combat –the hallmark of the knight- increasingly a thing of the past. Don Quixote, of course, is the perfect example of the incongruity of the chivalric knight in the age of gunpowder.

The famous Armada of 1588 is, for some, an early example of the disappearance of the heroic, chivalric world in the face of the impersonal force of fire power.

On their ships, the Spaniards carried soldiers prepared to board the English vessels and engage in hand to hand combat with their adversaries, and the artillery the ships carried played a mainly supportive role.

The English, however, with only sailors and gunners on board kept their distance and peppered the Spanish ships with cannon fire. Furthermore, the English ships were designed as gun carriers whereas the Spanish vessels were primarily troop carriers better suited for boarding tactics.

Religion:
One of the aims of Philip II when he launched the Armada was to reclaim England for Catholicism. Spain was not impervious to heresy and under Philip it became an increasingly closed society as the infamous Inquisition continued to root out religious deviance of any form.

In Italy, Spanish theologians had been prominent during the Council of Trent (Northern Italy, 1548-63) convened by Pope Paul III to reform the Roman Catholic Church in order to counteract the heresies of Protestantism. Known as the Counter-Reformation, the movement advocated a more aggressive diffusion of Catholic orthodoxy.

In Spain, this took the form of increased religiosity, particularly in literature and in the visible arts, e.g. painting and sculpture. Many allegorized romances of chivalry and pastoral works “a lo divino” (i.e. religious) now appeared, together with significant numbers of religious works.

Many of these latter contained sustained criticisms of romances of chivalry for their lies, for the immoral behavior of many knights and maidens, and for the harm they brought to readers. They also challenged the fabrications of the chivalric world by addressing day to day issues faced by the readers.

Literature.
Religious works were not the only challenge facing romances of chivalry. In the second half of the 16th century, pastoral literature and literature of Byzantine inspiration became popular. They offered something different, although like romances of chivalry, both were far removed from the realities of daily life.

Love was a common factor in all three, but in pastoral romances the nature of love and its complications –filtered through Neoplatonic philosophy- was the central thread. The pastoral world was essentially nostalgic and melancholic as shepherds -wandering through a stylized, Arcadian landscape- dissected their emotions. They contrasted their past happiness when their ladies (shepherdesses) returned their love with their present frustration as unrequited lovers.

The pastoral world appealed primarily to an educated, aristocratic readership, and in the case of prose pastorals, they were often “romans a clef” i.e. they offered the added spice of trying to work out the identity of real people hidden behind the shepherds’ masks.

Byzantine romances were as adventurous as romances of chivalry, but the emphasis was on the frustration of star-crossed lovers who found themselves constantly separated… until the end of the story. They inhabited a world of constant travel, shipwrecks, kidnappings, seductions, murder, even suicide; the defence of kings or kingdoms, battles, tournaments and jousts was not their concern.

In 1554, just as the romances of chivalry were beginning to decline, Lázaro de Tormes arrived on the scene. Everything about this newcomer was different from Amadís and his fellow knights.

Often called the first picaresque novel, the pseudo-autobiographical La vida de Lazarillo de Tormes y de sus fortunas y adversidades (The Life of Lazarillo de Tormes and of his Fortunes and Setbacks) was as short as Amadís de Gaula was long. Lázaro’s life was as much concerned with the battle for survival in a very real world as Amadís’s was with the battle for glory in the remote and rarified world of chivalry. Lazarillo‘s anticlerical content caused it to be placed on the 1559 Index of Prohibited Books. But like the proverbial genie released from the jar, the low born narrator was not going away. The pícaro (“rogue,” “scoundrel,” or female pícara) was only just beginning a journey into literary consciousness.

The fictional world of Lázaro and subsequent pícaros was not set in the distant past and in some faraway land, but in the urban centres of contemporary Spain. Hunger, and poverty were their constant companions, and hypocrisy, deception and prevarication were the lessons learnt from a corrupt and morally degenerate society.

Increasingly, too, picaresque works addressed a peculiarly Spanish obsession in the 16th and 17th centuries: limpieza de sangre (“purity of blood”). This was a social “virus” that marginalized all those thought to have Jewish (or Muslim) blood in their veins. Known as Conversos, -and often suspected of heresy— these individuals took extraordinary measures to hide their background, which only increased the suspicions of neighbours and frequently led to investigation by the dreaded Inquisition. By bringing these contemporary problems to the fore, the picaresque novel exposed the underbelly of society and offered readers a mirror of the challenges of daily living in their society.

The second half of the 16th century saw the rapid growth, too, of the theatre. The establishment of temporary theatres in the 1560s and permanent theatres –corrales— in large towns from about 1580 brought “live” entertainment directly to an enthusiastic public from all levels of society.

Themes varied widely, but comedias de espada y capa (“cloak and dagger plays”) and honour plays were popular choices. Boldly breaking with the classical unities of time, place and action, and introducing nobles and peasants together on stage, the theatre offered “live” representation of the concerns and interests of the public.

Besides honour, the comedia raised issues such as upward mobility, the relationship between peasants and nobility, purity of blood, the role of women, free will and predestination. Nevertheless, although the action in many plays might suggest some subversive element of social change, the endings invariably ended with order restored. Indeed, for many the theatre was in fact a propaganda tool for the nobility; for others the very presentation of different points of view got people thinking about other ways of seeing the world.

Social Changes:
Both the picaresque novel and the theatre were in their respective ways urban products. The picaresque novel found its subject matter primarily in city streets, the theatre -to sustain itself- needed a substantial audience found only in urban centres.

The growth of both the picaresque and the theatre in the second half of 16th-century Spain reflected a shift in the demographic pattern of the country. In general, the population increased for most of the 16th century with many cities doubling or tripling in size.

Urban growth was mainly the result of migration from the countryside, especially from the Castilian Meseta, an inhospitable plateau whose searing sun in summer and biting winds in the winter made the cultivation of the land a highly risky venture at the best of times, and these were not the best of times.

Inflation brought about by the influx of American gold or silver, high food prices, and an enormous tax burden (up 430% from 1559-1598), together with the perceived benefits of urban life, were more than enough to persuade peasants to head for the cities. This in turn produced urban crises in housing, sanitation, employment as cities struggled to accommodate newcomers. Charitable organizations helped ease the social tensions, but begging, crime and violence were widespread. Seville –then the largest city in Spain- was the Mecca for criminals, closely followed by Madrid.

Rapid urbanisation during the second half of the 16th century in Spain created new readers dissatisfied with those fantastic tales that had little to do with the realities of daily life. For most of these readers, the pícaro not only replaced the chivalric knight, he also pushed aside both shepherd and byzantine hero. For theatergoers, the comedia opened up a world of exciting possibilities where the contemporary knight –the noble— was seen to share the same space as the peasant.

Sources:
Armada 1588-1988. Official Catalogue London 1988
Kamen, Henry Spain 1469-1714: A Society in Conflict London 1983
Keegan, John A History of Warfare Toronto 1994
Fernández-Armesto, F The Spanish Armada Oxford 1989
Sieber, Harry in Romance: Generic Transformation from Chretien de Troyes to Cervantes eds. Brownlee, K and Brownlee M. S Hanover 1985 pp. 203-19
Vicens Vives, J ed. Historia de España y América social y económica, vol III, Barcelona 1985.

Although some might quibble over the exact dates, Spanish literature of the Golden Age (or Siglo de Oro in Spanish) usually refers to those works produced in Spain during the 16th and 17th centuries. It is a period that encompasses what is often broadly known–especially in other European countries- as the Renaissance and the Baroque.

Spain’s Golden Age was a period of extraordinary cultural flowering, and the innovations and originality of writers in each of the three literary genres –poetry, drama, and novel- are remarkable.

These innovations were not produced in a vacuum. They were the result of contact with and an awareness of the literary and philosophical currents of other European countries. Contact with Italy, the birthplace of the Renaissance, was particularly strong.

For example, a Spanish college was founded in Bologna (Italy) as early as the 1360s to enable poor scholars of Spanish origin to further their studies. (Antonio de Nebrija, who wrote the first Castilian grammar book and first Latin-Castilian dictionary studied there in the late 15th century.) In 1442, the kingdom of Naples was conquered by Alfonso V of Aragon, who quickly converted it into a literary and cultural centre.

Cultured Spaniards travelled to Italy to acquaint themselves with the latest trends and Italian scholars were invited to Spain. Spaniards became exposed, for example, to the love poetry of Petrarch (1304-74), the short stories of Boccaccio (1313-75), and the pastoral world of Sannazaro (1455-1530).

With Italian influence came also the revival of classical literature -particularly the verse of major poets such as Virgil, Horace and Ovid—and the philosophy of Plato (Neoplatonism). The result of all this was a radical enrichment in both language and thought.

In the 16th century, the succession of the Flemish-born Hapsburg heir, Carlos/ Charles I, to the Spanish crown in 1516 acquainted Spaniards with northern humanism, especially the works of Desiderius Erasmus (1469?–1536).

Later, towards the end of the 16th century, the growth of scepticism combined with stoicism, and the rediscovery of Aristotelianism –especially Aristotle’s Poetics— were instrumental in advancing one of the Spain’s major contributions to European Baroque thought: the interplay between appearances (parecer) and reality (ser), which more often than not lead to disillusionment (desegaño) and/or self-knowledge (conocerse). (Miguel de Cervantes, author of Don Quixote, is one of many writers who address the ambiguity produced by this interplay.)

Italian and Classical Influence was far-reaching but…
The radical cultural changes that took place at the beginning of the 16th century should not be seen as a break in continuity with Medieval tradition. For example, Medieval Spanish romances (a romance is a verse form best translated as ballad) continued to be sung and composed. Courtly love (which entered Spain at the end of the 12th century from Provence) remained vigorous, and novels (now generally referred to as “romances”) of chivalry) were enormously popular.

It would be more accurate to say that in Golden Age Spain the Medieval tradition and the Renaissance world fed off each other. Poets, for example, used the romance for a variety of topics, from love to satire; dramatists took advantage of the romance’s metre and galloping rhythm to advance the action of their plays.

Courtly love was no longer tied to the Medieval octosyllable (the 8-syllable line was the most common line in Spanish Medieval verse), but was a topic easily adapted to the Italian hendecasyllable (11-syllable line).

As for romances of chivalry, they were easily transformed into religious adventure novels (a lo divino), although the greatest transformation of this Medieval kind of adventure tale took place with the publication of Don Quixote. Without the romances of chivalry, Don Quixote would not have existed and the history of the novel would have been quite different.

Golden Age Poetry.
Of the three genres, poetry was the most admired in the Golden Age, and Spain was fortunate that the first important poet of the Siglo de Oro, Garcilaso de la Vega 1501-36, was extraordinarily gifted.

Following the example of his Catalan friend, Juan Boscán (1490-1542. Joan Boscà in Catalan), Garcilaso undertook an experiment that totally transformed Spanish verse and poetic language: together they replaced traditional Castilian metres and stanza forms with Italian metres and stanza forms.

Of the two, Garcilaso was the superior poet, and it was he who successfully made the transition. His other major successes included the adaptation of Petrarchan imagery of nature and self analysis, and the remarkable use of Virgilian pastoral landscape. His poetry became an inspiration and model for later poets of the Golden Age, and the subject of learned commentaries.

The development of Spanish verse in the Golden Age has traditionally been seen as a trajectory from Garcilaso to the Luis de Góngora (1561-1627), a poet who brilliantly captures the verbal inventiveness of the Baroque. Some may argue that a younger contemporary of Góngora, Francisco de Quevedo (1580-1645) was equally inventive, but he is equally if not better known as a prose writer and author of the picaresque novel El Buscón. Expanding the Spanish Golden Age to include Mexico, many anthologists also include a truly remarkable and original poet, much admired by feminists: Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz (1651-95).

Between Garcilaso and Góngora, there are numerous poets of outstanding quality, but we’ll only look at a few. Among them are San Juan de la Cruz (1542-91, widely known as St John of the Cross) and Fray Luis de León (1527-91). Both were religious poets but each quite different in his approach to God. Fernando de Herrera (ca 1534-97), on the other hand, was a secular poet, usually considered a bridge between Garcilaso and Góngora because of his verbal and syntactic innovations.

Golden Age Drama.
Golden Age drama (normally called comedia) is dominated by playwrights of the late 16th early 17th centuries. The most famous and influential within the development of the comedia is Lope de Vega (1562-1635), a prodigious writer whose works encompassed prose and verse as well as drama (e. g. Fuenteovejuna: The Sheepwell)

Tirso de Molina (1584?-1648), a pseudonym for Fray Gabriel Téllez, was not as prolific as Lope, but the protagonist of his best known play, El burlador de Sevilla (The Trickster of Seville), gave birth to the myth of one of the greatest lovers of world literature: Don Juan Tenorio.

Pedro Calderón de la Barca (1600-81) is generally considered the most consummate dramatist of the Siglo de Oro, and his philosophical drama La vida es sueño (Life is a Dream, is perhaps the most translated Golden Age play.

The earliest dramas of the Golden Age are usually attributed to Juan delEncina (1468-1530?), but more gifted was his Portuguese contemporary Gil Vicente (1465?-1536?) who wrote some 11 plays in Spanish. Still, the most interesting figure of this early period is Bartolomé de Torres Naharro (1485?-1520?), author of 9 plays and, more important, of the first Renaissance theory of drama not only in Spain but in Europe.

A common feature of these early dramatists is that their plays were written and performed in the courts or households of eminent political or religious patrons. Running parallel with this court theatre, we also have plays –usually classical, e.g. the comic works of Plautus and Terence, the tragedies of Seneca- put on in universities, religious drama celebrating church festivals, and popular skits or farces played out in town squares.

The second half of the 16th century saw the appearance of the first professional companies of actors as drama became commercialised, a reflection of the increasing popularity of plays in the rapidly growing towns and cities.

The companies played on improvised stages in any suitable space: the halls of the nobility, the courtyards of inns, patios or squares. Eventually the demands for more plays and better facilities in which to see them resulted in permanent theatres –corrales- in large towns. The most famous were the Corral de la Cruz (founded in 1579), and the Corral del Príncipe (1582), both in Madrid. The main centres were Madrid, Seville and Valencia.

(However, Spain’s only surviving theatre from its Golden Age is to be found in the small town of Almagro, about 160 kilometres/100 miles south of Toledo. Originally the open courtyard of an inn, its whereabouts was unknown for a long time and was only discovered in 1950.)

The corrales also had a very useful social as well as entertainment value: municipalities and charitable organisations (which had been prominent in establishing the early corrales) found that revenues from plays could help them set up hospitals and pay for their upkeep.

No playwright could be indifferent to the success of the corrales. They provided the perfect opportunity for writers such as the prolific Lope de Vega to reach a wide and demanding audience. With popularity came fame and with fame came the possibility of social advancement and well-being.

Lope was the dramatic genius who established the norms for what became known as the comedia nueva (new drama) which all other dramatists followed in one way or another (e.g. structure, use of verse forms, themes).

Golden Age Prose Fiction.
Prose fiction of the Golden Age is extremely rich and varied and culminates with a remarkable number of novels at the beginning of the 17th century, the most famous of which is Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes.

Cervantes’ main inspiration for Don Quixote were the romances (prose fiction) of chivalry, the favourite form of literature at all social levels in the first half of the 16th century. Of these romances, the most popular was Amadís de Gaula, the “father” of the Spanish romances of chivalry, first mentioned in the early 14th century but not published until 1508. A flood of sequels and spin offs followed, the son of Amadís, the grandson of Amadís and so on (their circulation was made easier thanks to the printing press, which first appeared in Spain in 1474).

The romances of chivalry lost much of their popularity in the second half of the 16th century, to be replaced -mainly in aristocratic circles- by the pastoral novel. At the same time, the Moorish novel or novela morisca made its appearance, following the publication of the little gem El Abencerraje y la hermosa Jarifa 1561.

Of the other prose fiction forms, the Spanish sentimental romances of the 15th century or earlier enjoyed some success in the Golden Age, as did Byzantine romances of Greek inspiration (in the latter years of the 16th century). None, however, were to have the impact of a new literary form that might be loosely called the “realistic” novel. In these realistic novels, the action was contemporary, the location recognisable, and the characters credible.

We can begin with La Celestina, a work written in 21 acts and therefore sometimes classified as a drama but which reads like a novel. It first appeared in 1499 and became a 16th-century “best seller,” spawning numerous continuations, imitations and translations. For many readers, La Celestina is the greatest literary work in Spanish after Don Quixote, yet strangely it is not well known beyond the Spanish speaking world.

Lazarillo de Tormes, an anonymous work first published in 1554 is neither an imitation nor continuation of La Celestina, although the world it portrays is just as real. It tells the story in first person of the early years of Lázaro, the narrator.

Frequently called the first picaresque novel, it is a very complex albeit short narrative which was soon placed on the famous 1559 Index of Prohibited Books (Index Librorum Prohibitorum) for its anticlerical content. It remained unpublished in Spain until 1573 when a mutilated version, Lazarillo castigado, appeared. Suppressed are chapters 4 and 5 and passages elsewhere obviously considered irreverent by the church authorities. Such censorship might be expected given the increased atmosphere of religious orthodoxy in Spain in the second half of the 16th century, a period known as the Counter Reformation in Spanish and European history.

Given this religious orthodoxy, it isn’t surprising that no other similar book was published in Spain until 1599 when the First Part of Guzmán de Alfarache appeared (a Second Part came out in 1604). Written by Mateo Alemán, it is a long, digressive work in which the narrator Guzmán details his life from birth in Seville to his position as a galley slave on a Spanish ship.

A “best seller” in its day, it is a fundamental text in the history of picaresque fictional novels. It was soon followed by several others novels in the same vein, the most important being El buscón (The Swindler) by Francisco de Quevedo, possibly written in 1604 but not published until 1626.

The picaresque texts are relatively unknown beyond the Spanish-speaking world, but the same cannot be said about Don Quixote. Published in two parts, 1605 and 1615, it describes the adventures and conversations of the would-be knight-errant, don Quixote de la Mancha, and his faithful squire Sancho Panza.

That sounds simple, but the book’s very simplicity is deceptive. In the Prologue to Part I, Cervantes tells us that the book is an “invective” against or attack on romances of chivalry. But if it were just that, then there wouldn’t be such a large and constantly growing library of books devoted to interpreting and explaining it. Its meaning is elusive, because like life itself it can never be pigeonholed.

Don Quixote appeared in a period of extraordinary literary flowering, just as Spain was undergoing severe social stress and its political power and territorial integrity were already being threatened. With hindsight, we can see that Spain’s Golden Age of literature was coming to an end too, but it went out in a golden blaze and not with a whimper.

Sources.
Deyermond, A.D A Literary History of Spain: The Middle Ages London 1971
Gies, David ed. The Cambridge History of Spanish Literature Cambridge 2004
Eisenberg, D Romances of Chivalry in the Spanish Golden Age Newark, 1982
Jones, R.O. A Literary History of Spain: The Golden Age Prose and Poetry London, 1971
Thacker, Jonathan A Companion to Golden Age Theatre Woodbridge, England 2007
Wilson, Edward and Moir, Duncan A Literary History of Spain: The Golden Age Drama London, 1971

In the Spanish context, the term “Golden Age” (or El Siglo de Oro: literally “Golden Century”) refers to a period of outstanding achievements that encompass a wide range of activities: in politics, literature, art, sculpture, architecture, theological and humanistic studies (i.e. the study of classical culture), philosophy, law etc.

However, the chronological frame covering the “Golden Age” is open to debate, and the criteria adopted for the definition vary. For our purposes, the period between 1474 to 1700 seems appropriate.

1474 is the year when the two most powerful kingdoms in the Iberian peninsula were united under the Catholic Monarchs, Ferdinand and Isabella; 1700 marks the death of the last Hapsburg king of Spain, Charles II, and the appearance of the Bourbon dynasty from France.

The chronological criterion adopted here is political and admittedly arbitrary, but within this frame Spain’s cultural accomplishments were remarkable and place it on par with those of other European countries, notably France, England, and Italy.

San Juan de la Cruz (1542-91): Llama de amor viva (Living Flame of Love).
Anyone interested in mystical literature will sooner or later come across San Juan de la Cruz (St. John of the Cross). The Spanish saint lived a busy life, and his poetic output was modest: nineteen poems.

His fame rests mainly on three poems: Noche oscura (Dark Night), Cántico espiritual (Spiritual Song), and Llama de amor viva (Living Flame of Love). These poems are widely acknowledged to be amongst the best expressions of mystical love in any language, although at a superficial level they could be interpreted as erotic secular verse.

The mystical union of the soul with God, the desired object of religious experience, is an impossible feeling to put into words. So, in order for readers to get some sense of what the mystical experience was, San Juan turned to human, sexual love as a metaphor for the intensely spiritual sensation.

To achieve the desired union with God, the soul must discard earthly passions and desires and undertake a three-stage, spiritual journey: the vía purgativa (the cleansing or purifying step), the vía iluminativa (the path of enlightenment or illumination) and the vía unitiva (the stage of union).

Here, we’ll focus on Llama de amor viva, a remarkable poem that centres on the vía unitiva and post union repose. As is the case with Noche oscura, an explanatory preface points to how the poem should be read: “Songs of the soul in its intimate communication (and) union with God’s love.”

Llama de amor viva.
Llama… consists of four stanzas (songs), each consisting of six lines with a combination of heptasyllables and hendecasyllables (7 and 11 syllables) and a consonantal rhyming pattern abCabC (the six lines are a variation of the usual 5-line lira; the lower case letter = 7 syllables and upper case = 11 syllables).

Unlike Noche oscura, which describes a past experience of mystical union, Llama de amor viva recreates the experience as an intensely felt moment through the use of the present tense. Here (again unlike Noche oscura), there is no journey or shedding of earthly appetites but instead the soul’s immediate emotional expression of the bliss it experiences when united with its lover.

The poem can be divide into two equal parts each built around images of light and fire: !Oh llama de amor…! and !Oh lámparas de fuego. The first half is intense with paradoxical and suggestively violent images (oxymora): e.g. stanza 2, line 1 portrays a sensation that both cauterises (i.e. burns) and is gentle or sweet.

The second half is more difficult to understand and is emotionally more restrained: there are, for example, fewer exclamations, and no violent paradoxes. The reason for this is that the poem moves from the profound and searing effects of the purifying fire in stanzas 1 and 2 to a reflective recognition of the power of the fire which illuminates the dark caverns of the senses. The poem concludes with the soul affirming that her lover’s (i.e. God’s) love and gentleness inspires still more love in her.

Stanzas 1 and 2.
¡Oh llama de amor viva Oh living flame of love
que tiernamente hieres that tenderly wounds
de mi alma en el más profundo centro!, the deepest centre of my soul!
pues ya no eres esquiva, since you are no longer indifferent,
acaba ya si quieres, kill (me) if you wish,
rompe la tela de este dulce encuentro. break the fabric of this sweet encounter.

¡Oh cautiverio suave! Oh gentle burning!
¡oh regalada llaga! Oh delicate wound!
¡oh mano blanda! ¡oh toque delicado Oh gentle hand! Oh delicate touch
que a vida eterna sabe, that tastes of eternal life,
y toda deuda paga! and pays off all (my) debts!
Matando, muerte en vida la has trocado. (By) killing me, you have turned death into life.

The opening two stanzas are deeply felt songs which recreate the ecstasy the soul experiences in her union with the personified Living Flame of Love (the Holy Ghost** according to San Juan).

How is the intensity of that union captured? First, by the anaphora Oh! which is used five times, and with increasing intensity in the second stanza (four times) where the act of union between soul and lover reaches its climax. Second, by a series of oxymora that unites opposites of violence and tenderness, conflicting sensations often experienced in the sexual act. Here, for example, the Flame of Love “tenderly wounds,” and it “breaks the fabric of this gentle encounter.” Third, by what is essentially a passionate plea by the soul at the end of the first stanza: acaba (“kill”) and rompe (“break”).

The reason for such an unusual request becomes clear in the stanza 2: the soul experiences exquisite sensations described paradoxically as “gentle burning,” “delicate wound,” which, administered by the lover’s hand and gentle touch, lead to death. This death, however, paradoxically leads to life (st. 2. l. 6).

The immediate lead up to the final paradox of death equals life is brilliantly conveyed by a striking synesthesia**: “the gentle touch that tastes of eternal life.” Taste and touch are amongst the most basic of our senses, and play an active erotic role in lovemaking.

How can touch be conceived as taste? By bringing them together, San Juan suggests that they are interchangeable, that nothing separates one sense from the other, as indeed is the case between the soul and her lover, i.e. taste and touch are one, soul and lover are one. It is this total union that leads to a loss of self and to death and then to spiritual life: “By killing (me), you have turned (my) death into life.”

Stanzas 3 and 4.
¡Oh lamparas de fuego Oh lamps of fire
en cuyos resplandores in whose radiance
las profundas cavernas del sentido, the deep caverns of the senses
-que estaba oscuro y ciego- -which were dark and blind-
con extranos primores with exquisite delicacy
calor y luz dan junto a su querido! together give warmth and light to their beloved!

¡Cuan manso y amoroso How gently and lovingly
recuerdas en mi seno, you wake up upon my breast,
donde secretamente solo moras; where secretly you alone dwell;
en tu aspirar sabroso, with your delicious breath
de bien y gloria lleno, full of joy and glory
cuan delicadamente me enamoras! how sweetly you inspire me to love you.

After ecstasy comes rest and reflection, which is what we find in stanzas 3 and 4. Although the light and fire image (lámparas de fuego) that opens stanza 3 parallels the Living Flame (Llama … viva) of the beginning line of stanza 1, the erotically laden “ohs” have disappeared as have the violent paradoxes. Now the mood is reflective and descriptive.

In stanza 3, the soul explains how the rays (resplandores) from the lamps of fire illuminated and transformed the dark caverns of her earthly senses -previously dark and blind— into spiritual senses, i.e. light. And this light, in turn, with exquisite delicacy, gives light and warmth to the soul’s lover. This mutual exchange of light is the result of the soul’s new life and evidence of the complete fusion experienced by the soul with her beloved after her “death” (stanza 2, line 6). The act of love, then, is two way.

Stanza 3 presents a brief moment of reflection by the soul while her beloved is asleep. We deduce that her lover is asleep from stanza 4 when she again addresses him as he wakes up (recuerdas: “you wake up”).

The picture the soul describes in stanza 4 echoes the post union description we find in Noche oscura. It presents an intimate image of the soul talking to her lover as he wakes up on her breast. This deeply tender and personal moment opens with two adjectives used adverbially manso (“gently”) and amoroso (“lovingly”) and is underlined by the exclusive relationship between the soul and her lover: her breast is reserved for him alone (donde secretamente solo moras: “where secretly you alone dwell”).

The soul concludes with a striking image of how her beloved’s delicious (literally “tasty”) breath inspires love in her. To evoke her beloved’s breath is fitting for two reasons: 1. breath has no material form and complements the spiritual love that is at the heart of the poem, and 2. breath can paradoxically be felt and, in this case, be tasted, which is basic in the act of love. Touch and taste again, but now bathed in light and warmth.

The image cleverly brings together, then, the two halves of the poem: the first which is dominated by the sense of touch and the second enhanced by the presence of light. Likewise, the final word of the poem, (me) enamoras, returns us to the opening line of the poem: !Oh llama de amor. These are the only lines in which the word “love” appears; structurally and conceptually it unites the whole poem.

The vocabulary used by San Juan is simple even though the concepts expressed pose challenges. The imagery of wounding, burning, killing, and dying related to love is not original; it can be found in the 15th-century Castilian courtly love lyric and Petrarchan verse tradition, both of which were inspired by medieval courtly love poetry.

Playing with concepts and words became part and parcel of the language of this secular poetry, and San Juan too was adept at it. For example, in a romance (ballad) dealing with the opening lines of the Gospel according to St John, San Juan writes: El mismo Verbo Dios era/ que el principio se dezía/ el morava en el principio/ y principio no tenía (“God was the Word itself/ who was called the beginning/ he lived in the beginning/ and had no beginning./ He himself was the beginning / And so had none (i.e. no beginning).” Of course, the Christian doctrine of the Trinity, of God Three in One, was a concept that lent itself to wordplay, but San Juan had the innate ability to avoid trite repetition. He was able — to paraphrase the linguist and historian, Ambrosio de Morales, 1546- “to select and … to put words together” (escoger y saber juntar las palabras), which is perhaps the secret of all great writers.

Sources:
Rivers, Elias Renaissance and Baroque Poetry of Spain, Prospect Heights, Illinois 1988. (Has very useful English prose translations).
Thompson, Colin St. John of the Cross: Songs in the Night Washington, D.C. 2003.
Walters, D. Gareth The Cambridge Introduction to Spanish Poetry Cambridge 2002.
Weber, Alison P. “Religious Literature in Early Modern Spain,” in The Cambridge History of Spanish Literature, ed. David T. Gies Cambridge 2009, pp. 149-58.
Ynduraín, Domingo San Juan de la Cruz: Poesías Madrid 3rded. 1987.

San Juan de la Cruz. St. John of the Cross 1542-91.
Born Juan de Yepes in Fontiveros in the province of Avila, San Juan de la
Cruz (St. John of the Cross) was one of the great poets of Spain’s Golden Age (16th and 17th centuries) and is widely regarded as one of the most outstanding exponents of mystical poetry in any language.

Following studies at a Jesuit school (1559-63), San Juan entered the Carmelite Order in 1563, at the age of 21. From 1564 to 1568, he studied at the University of Salamanca, at that time one of the leading universities in Europe.

1567 was decisive year for San Juan: he was ordained priest and met the charismatic Santa Teresa de Avila (St. Theresa), a Carmelite nun engaged in reforming the Order. San Juan actively supported Santa Teresa’s reforms aimed at restoring the Order’s earlier simplicity. This led to his imprisonment in Toledo in 1577 at the hands of Carmelite monks who opposed Santa Teresa’s changes. The result of the ensuing rupture in the Order was the creation of the Discalced (i.e. Barefoot) Carmelites, with Santa Teresa and San Juan as their founding inspiration.

San Juan escaped from his prison in 1578 and spent the next ten years establishing Discalced Carmelite monasteries in Andalusia (e.g. in Málaga, Córdoba, Manchuela (Jaén), Caravaca (Murcia). After a three-year hiatus as prior in Segovia (Castile, 1588-91), he returned to Andalusia. Always rather delicate of health, he died in Ubeda in December 1591. He was beatified by the Catholic Church in 1675, canonised in 1726 and made Doctor of the Church in 1926.

San Juan’s poetic output was very modest, and his period of poetic activity relatively short, mainly between his imprisonment in 1577-78 and 1585, when his travels and monastery-founding demands claimed much of his time. Although his best known poems are written in liras, an Italian stanza form introduced into Spain by Garcilaso de la Vega, San Juan actually wrote more verse using the traditional Castilian metre. Where liras generally consisted of five lines with a combination of heptasyllables and hendecasyllables (7 and 11 syllables), much of traditional Spanish poetry was written in octosyllables (8 syllables). San Juan’s use of both Renaissance Italian metres and traditional Spanish metres was not unusual. One of the features of Spain’s literary Golden Age was that after Garcilaso poets moved freely between both traditions.

San Juan’s fame as poet rests primarily on three poems: the Noche oscura (Dark Night, popularly known as Dark Night of the Soul), the Cántico espiritual (Spiritual Song), and the Llama de amor viva (Living Flame of Love). They are poems that describe the mystical or transcendental (otherworldly) experience of the soul’s search for and unity with God. At the request of some Discalced Carmelite monks and nuns, San Juan wrote lengthy explanatory commentaries on each, as an aid to their understanding,

The mystical path to union between the soul and God follows three stages: the vía purgativa (the cleansing or purifying stage), the vía iluminativa (the path to enlightenment or illumination), and the vía unitiva (the stage of union). These are difficult paths that require the soul to purge itself of its sins and appetites and discard the worldly activity of the senses and the flesh. Only then can the soul –now purified— experience the bliss of divine union.

Such mystical experience is so difficult to capture that, in order to approximate the intensity of the blissful encounter with God, San Juan makes use of erotic imagery drawn from our common human experiences. And to bring us closer to that experience, he dramatizes or personalises the soul’s longing and its search. In the Cántico, for example, we have a loving dialogue between the wife (Esposa, or the soul) and the husband (Esposo, or Christ). In Noche oscura, a young girl (the soul) narrates an adventurous escape to meet her lover (God). In Llama de amor viva the soul addresses her lover (God) and recreates the state of ecstatic union she experiences when with Him.

La noche oscura. Dark Night (of the Soul).
To illustrate San Juan’s way of conveying the soul’s search and joy at achieving mystical union with God, we’ll focus here on the Noche oscura.

It’s an allegorical love poem in which a lovesick girl narrates how she escapes from her house in search of her lover. However, we need the full title to avoid the ambiguity that could otherwise occur: “Songs of the soul which rejoices at having reached the highest stage of perfection, which is union with God via the path of spiritual self-denial.” This helps us to understand that the lovesick girl is a metaphor for the soul and that the house is metaphorically the body.

This clarification is important because nowhere in the poem do the words “soul” (alma), or “body” (cuerpo) or “God” (Dios) appear, and superficially the poem could be read as an erotic secular poem of a lovers’ tryst. But even read at this level, it still succeeds, speaking of the “mystery, wonder, tenderness and intimacy of a truly mutual relationship; it reveals sexual love as discovery, encounter, transformation, fulfilment” (Thompson 85).

Noche oscura is an eight-stanza poem which combines the three stages leading to mystical union. The stanza form of the poem is the lira. Each stanza is composed of five lines, combining lines of seven and eleven syllables (heptasyllables and hendecasyllables). The rhyming scheme is consonantal: aBabB, (lower case = heptasyllable, upper case = hendecasyllable).

Noche oscura is best read aloud, because the combination of the soft labial sounds (“n, m, b, v”) and the sibilant “s” (especially in stanzas 1 and 2) are beautifully adjusted to the sense of silence, secrecy and weightlessness that accompanies the young girl on her nocturnal escape from her home.

Stanzas 1 and 2.
En una noche oscura, On a dark night,
con ansias en amores inflamada, inflamed by the passions of love,
!Oh dichosa ventura! oh joyous fortune!
Salí sin ser notada, I left unnoticed,
estando ya mi casa sosegada. since my house was now at rest.

a escuras y segura, in the dark and safely,
por la secreta escala disfrazada, by the secret ladder in disguise,
!oh dichosa ventura! oh joyous fortune!
a escuras y en celada, in the dark and concealed,
estando ya mi casa sosagada. since my house was now at rest.

The escape is an adventure that takes place secretly (Salí sin ser notada: “I left without being seen”) at night and in silence. Why is the soul undertaking this trip and what is she fleeing from? Because she is passionately in love (con ansias en amores inflamada) and her flight is a joyous (dichosa) escape from the body which is now at rest (sosegada).

The repetition of the exclamatory oh dichosa ventura (st. 1 line 3, st. 2 line 3) and estando ya mi casa sosegada (line 5 in both stanzas) underlines the joyous relief at now being able to escape from the body’s earthly appetites. It is the night that makes this possible, hence the noche dichosa (“joyous night”) that we read in stanza 3, line 1.

In stanza 2, the flight continues with one new element added to the escape of stanza 1: the means of escape, the hidden ladder (secreta escala) . Ladders are a common image in love poetry; they are used to gain access to a house or, as is the case here, to facilitate the girl’s escape or elopement. Adding to the sense of adventure is the disguise worn by the soul (which according to San Juan in his prose commentary on this poem was a white, green and red mantle, symbols of faith, hope and charity).

Emphasis has been placed in the first two stanzas on three elements: night, secrecy and joyous escape as the soul discards fleshly matters. This is the vía purgativa, the cleansing stage.

Stanzas 3 and 4.
En una noche dichosa, On a joyous night,
en secreto, que nadie me veía, in secret, for no one saw me,
ni yo miraba cosa, nor did I look at anything,
sin otra luz y guía, with no other light or guide.
sino la que en el corazón ardía. but the one that burned in my heart.

Aquesta me guiaba This (light) guided me
más cierto que la luz del mediodía, more surely than the midday light,
a donde me esperaba to where awaited me
quien yo bien me sabía, he whom I knew well,
en parte donde nadie parecía. in a place where no one else appeared.

In these stanzas, the soul enters the second stage, the vía iluminativa or path of enlightenment. Joy and secrecy are reaffirmed immediately in the first two lines of stanza 3, as the soul follows the light that burns within her (the source of which is the lover’s love burning in her heart, corazón). Now the physical world (the house and the ladder) that keeps the soul earthbound has disappeared and we enter the weightless, ethereal world of light.

Light (luz) is used twice and pronouns alluding to light are also used twice: (la (luz) que en el corazón …, and Aquesta (luz) me guíaba). And where does this light guide the soul? To him “whom I know well” (quien yo bien me sabía), i.e. the lover. And where is the lover? In that “place where no one else was to be seen” (en parte donde nadie parecía). Secrecy is now accompanied by mystery: who is this lover and where are they meeting?

Stanza 5.
!Oh noche que guiaste! Oh night that guided me!
!oh noche amable más que el alborada! oh night more pleasing than the dawn!
!oh noche que juntaste oh night that joined together
amado con amada, lover with beloved,
amada en el amado transformada! (with) beloved transformed into lover!

Stanza 5 is an exceptional piece of writing and is the climax (pun intended) of the poem, i.e. it is the union of the beloved and the lover, the vía unitiva. The flight has ended and what we have now is the experience of the union. Although there are two verbs (que guiaste, que juntaste) they function rather as adjectives, both modifying noche.

The experience begins with the anaphora (repetition at the beginning of a sequence of lines) !Oh noche…” in the first three lines imparts a sense of urgency that mimics the ecstasy of lovemaking. Under cover of darkness, lover and beloved unite as one. And how is the union itself conveyed? By a remarkable interchange of the nouns “lover” and “beloved” (amado-amada-amado-amada) in the last two lines of the stanza ending with the key word transformada.

Night has provided the means for the lover to be joined with the beloved and for the beloved to be transformed into the lover. The rapid exchange of the nouns evokes the image of highly charged mutual embraces or coupling as they become one together. The soul has lost her spiritual virginity having been transformed in the course of their lovemaking. Their union, however, is not violent but tender, a sensation brilliantly conveyed by the labial “m,” the soft “d,” and the experience is lengthened by the open vowels “o” and “a.”

Stanzas 6-8.
En mi pecho florido, On my flowering breast
que entero para él solo se guardaba, that was kept entirely for him alone
alli quedó dormido, there he fell asleep,
y yo le regalaba; and I caressed him,
y el ventalle de cedros aire daba. and the cedar leaves fanned him gently.

El aire de la almena, The breeze came from the battlements,
cuando yo sus cabellos esparcía, (and) when I was stroking his hair,
con su mano serena with his gentle hand
en mi cuello hería, he wounded my neck,
y todos mis sentidos suspendía. (which left) all my senses suspended.

Quedéme y olvidéme, I stayed still and forgot myself,
el rostro recliné sobre el amado, my face I laid on my beloved,
cesó todo, y dejéme, everthing stopped, and I abandoned myself,
dejando mi cuidado leaving all my cares
entre las azucenas olvidado. forgotten among the lilies.

We now pass to the post union state of repose although still infused by eroticism, but of a languid kind: the lover sleeps on the flowery breast of the girl which has been reserved only for him. Whilst the lover sleeps, the beloved tenderly caresses him while leaves from cedar trees provided a gentle breeze.

In stanza 7, the eroticism is conveyed by the lover’s hair** (which the young girl has been stroking) and the wound that she receives which leaves her senses suspended in wonder.

In the last stanza (8), a series of verbs in the past preterite tense rapidly and concisely summarise the young girl’s suspended state: it is total stillness and a complete forgetting of herself. Everything ceases as she abandons herself, and in tranquil oblivion leaves her cares forgotten among the lilies.

It is an evocative picture, with the lilies –and the purity associated with their white colour- reaffirming the delicate, spiritual nature of the union. Sebastián de Covarubias’s dictionary Tesoro de la lengua castellana (1611) describes the lily as símbolo de la castidad por su blancura, y de la buena fama por su olor (“symbol of chastity because of its whiteness and fame because of its fragrance”).
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San Juan’s sources are varied, but references to the wound of love, to the lover resting on the beloved’s breasts, to the lover’s hair, to cedars and to lilies recall the Jewish love songs that make up the Old Testament’s Song of Solomon (or Song of Songs), although San Juan’s poem is much more restrained and avoids direct sensual allusions.

The youthful feminine voice may also spring from the Song of Solomon but it was also very common in popular, profane poetry of different cultures. The image of the night seen in favourable terms also has a long history in love poetry, both secular and religious. After all, it favours lovers with the opportunity to meet secretly and wraps them in a cloak of silence and protective darkness.

A frequent accompaniment of the secret escape is the ladder that enables exit from or entry to the lovers’ trysts (e.g. Calisto and Melibea’s meetings in La Celestina).

San Juan’s success was in creating a series of images in which secrecy and mystery draw us immediately into the “action” which moves in three stages: escape, fulfilment, repose. Spanish readers will know immediately that the narrating “I” is a woman (from the feminine ending “a” of notada), but where is she going at night, alone? Our common understanding of this experience tells us that she is going to meet her lover. But the identity of the lover remains a mystery, although not the pleasure and fulfilment derived from the adventurous escape and joyous union.
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Noche oscura forms part of a wide tapestry of increased religiosity in Spanish culture (literature, art, sculpture) in the second half of the 16th century. Much of it was inspired by the Catholic Church’s call to counteract the growth of Protestantism and to address concerns voiced by Catholic thinkers. It is a period commonly referred to as the Counter Reformation.

The reforms were formulated by the Council of Trent, a series of meetings held in the town of Trent in northern Italy between 1545 and 1563. Among other things, they advocated a greater and more militant spiritual and doctrinal message to the faithful.

A partial response to the Catholic Church’s concerns was the appropriation of secular works and their conversion into sacred or devotional allegories, a lo divino, e.g. the poetry of Garcilaso de la Vega was rendered a lo divino, so too were romances of chivalry and pastoral novels. We’ll look in more detail at the reasons for this trend towards devotional writing in a another page.

Sources:
Rivers, Elias Renaissance and Baroque Poetry of Spain, Prospect Heights, Illinois 1966, reissued 1988. (Has very useful English prose translations).
Thompson, Colin St. John of the Cross: Songs in the Night Washington, D.C. 2003 (see pp. 85-95 for a detailed and excellent analysis of Noche oscura).
Walters, D. Gareth The Cambridge Introduction to Spanish Poetry Cambridge 2002.
Weber, Alison P. “Religious Literature in Early Modern Spain,” in The Cambridge History of Spanish Literature, ed. David T. Gies Cambridge 2009, pp. 149-58.
Yndurain, Domingo San Juan de la Cruz: Poesias Madrid 3rd ed. 1987.
Image of San Juan by Francisco de Zurbarán - www.muzeum.archidiecezja.katowice.pl, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=20327786
San Juan’s statue in Fontiveros By Dahis - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=18174851