JORGE GUILLÉN: BIOGRAPHY, STYLE AND WORKS - LITERATURE - 2024

Jorge Guillén Álvarez (1893-1984) was a poet and literary critic of Spanish origin. He was part, like many so many intellectuals of his time, of the Generation of 27. However, his literary work was developed late, being greatly influenced by the writer Juan Ramón Jiménez.

Guillén's work was characterized in its beginnings by its optimistic vision, and its constant celebration of life. His poetry was devoid of decorations or literary devices. The writer focused on the development of precise words from his passion for existence itself.

Jorge Guillén and childhood. Source: oSiRis Naref from Valladolid, Spain, via Wikimedia Commons

With the passage of time the poetic work of the writer took some turns, and became more reflective and melancholic. It is important to note that despite being a late poet, the recognition came early, because he was worthy of several awards and the appreciation of his colleagues.

Biography

Birth and family

Jorge Guillén was born in Valladolid on January 18, 1893, in the nucleus of a well-off family. His parents were Julio Guillén and Esperanza Álvarez. The poet lived all his childhood and youth in his hometown, and received a careful education.

Guillén Studies

The first years of study of the poet, both primary and high school, were attended in prestigious schools in Valladolid. Upon graduating from high school, he moved to Madrid to study philosophy and letters at the Central University, living in the Student Residence.

Between 1909 and 1911 he made a hiatus and went to live in Switzerland, where he learned French. Later he resumed his higher studies and obtained a degree in 1913 from the University of Granada. Four years later he served as a Spanish reader at La Sorbonne, until 1923.

After having spent a period in several European cities, he returned to Madrid to study for a doctorate. In 1924 he achieved the title, with a thesis on the thought of the Spanish playwright Luís de Góngora. Guillén, at that time, exhibited on Góngora's excellent work, El Polifemo.

The great love of the poet

In 1919, during his college trips to France, he met his first wife, Germaine Cahen. The young woman captivated him, and for a long time they maintained their relationship with letters, about 793. More than a hundred were written by him in French, until the bride learned Spanish.

Love was stronger than distance, and in 1921, when the poet turned eighteen, they were married. As a result of love and passion, two children were born: Claudio and Teresa. Each was the great love of their lives, they had a harmonious marriage.

Academic life

After Jorge Guillén received his doctorate, he worked as a professor in the department of literature at the University of Murcia for four years, from 1925 to 1929. During this period, he founded the magazine Verso y Prosa, with the collaboration of two friends and colleagues.

After teaching classes in Murcia, he did the same at the University of Seville until the culmination of the Spanish Civil War. He frequently traveled to Madrid to meet new members of the Residencia de Estudiantes, such as the famous poet Federico García Lorca.

Literary path

Poem by Jorge Guillén in the Castle of Montealegre. Source: Nicolás Pérez, from Wikimedia Commons

Between 1919 and 1928 Guillén published several of his works in the Revista de Occidente. At the end of the 1920s he began to write Cántico, a work that initially had seventy-five poems, and which he expanded throughout his career.

At the same time, the poet made his way into the world of literature as a contributor to intellectual magazines such as España, Index and La Pluma. He also took up translation work, such as the works of the French writers Jules Supervielle and Paul Valéry.

He continued his activity as a writer and professor in the following years. However, much of his work was produced during exile. Works such as Place of Lazarus, According to the Hours, On the Margin, Final and several expanded editions of his famous Canticle stood out.

The poet in exile

At the time of the start of the Civil War in 1936, the poet was in his homeland, Valladolid. Like many intellectuals, he was considered a political threat, so he was briefly jailed in Pamplona. Later he returned to his teaching job, but in 1938 he decided to leave the country.

He went to live in the United States with his wife and children. A few years later, in 1947, his wife passed away, which was a severe blow to him. However, the writer was able to recover. Two years later, despite his exile, he was able to return for a short time to Spain to visit his sick father.

He continued his life in North America, working as a professor at the universities of Middlebury, Wellesley and McGill, the latter located in Montreal, Canada. It was normal at that time to see him attending multiple events. In 1957 he decided to stop teaching at Wellesley University.

Second knock of love at the poet's door

At that time he returned to Europe, made a brief stop in Malaga, and also spent time in Italy. In 1958, when he was in Florence, he met Irene Mochi-Sismondi, whom he married three years later in Bogotá, Colombia, thus becoming his second wife.

Continuity of his teaching work and death

Later he resumed his activity as a teacher. He was a professor at the University of Puerto Rico and Harvard. The years were mitigating his health, and in 1970 he fell and injured his hip, for which he had to withdraw from teaching.

His career as a poet made him worthy of the Cervantes Prize in 1976, and a year later he was awarded the international recognition Alfonso Reyes, a Mexican award. Andalusia named him Favorite Son. The poet died a year later, in February 1984, in Malaga.

Style

Jorge Guillén's literary style was characterized by the use of a fairly elaborate language, which at the same time can be difficult for the reader to understand. The poet did not use harmonious or slightly musical words; on the contrary, he rejected flattery and the use of rhetorical ornaments or ornaments.

Guillén was a poet with dense and complex words, inclined towards pure poetry that opposed the essential and fundamental. In his verses the constant use of nouns is notorious, mostly without articles or verbs; he preferred the use of names to give essence to circumstances and things.

Also highlighted in the author's poetry was the use of short verses, those of minor art, and also the exposition of exclamatory sentences. A good part of the poetic work of the writer was positive and enthusiastic towards the life, later it took a turn towards the pain, the longing and the loss.

Plays

Guillén's most important works are shown below:

Poetry

- Cántico (1928, in that first edition it had seventy-five poems).

- Second installment of Cántico (1936, the work was expanded to one hundred and twenty-five poems).

- Third presentation of Canticle (1945, the publication had a total of two hundred and seventy writings).

- Fourth and last presentation of Cántico (1950, with three hundred thirty-four poems).

- Huerto de Melibea (1954).

- Of the dawn and the awakening (1956).

- Clamor. Maremagnum (1957).

- Place of Lázaro (1957).

- Clamor… That they are going to give in the sea (1960).

- Natural history (1960).

- The temptations of Antonio (1962).

- According to the hours (1962).

- Clamor. At the height of the circumstances (1963).

- Tribute. Meeting of lives (1967).

- Our air: song, clamor, homage (1968).

- Civil garland (1970).

- On the sidelines (1972).

- And other poems (1973).

- Coexistence (1975).

- Final (1981).

- The expression (1981).

- Celestial Mechanics (2001).

Prose

Within the prose the following criticisms stood out:

- Language and poetry (1962).

- The plot of the work (1969).

Jorge Guillén Street, in Malaga. Source: Tyk, from Wikimedia Commons

- About Gabriel Miró, a brief epistolary (1973).

In addition to these manuscripts, prologues to some of the works of the also Spanish writer Federico García Lorca (1898-1936) stood out.

Brief description of Guillén's most representative works

Chant

It was one of the most important works of Jorge Guillén and also of 20th century Spanish literature. The collection of poems went through four editions, where in each of them the poet was improving and expanding the number of poems he had, until he reached 334.

The collection of poems showed the author's way of thinking, his position of faith and hope in life. With the passage of time the topics were changing. Guillén raised the existence of man, his relationship with things, love, pain, melancholy, among other profound themes.

In the four editions, love and reality were consistent, seen from the integrity and perfection of the writer. Furthermore, in this work, Guillén explored the ways to find pleasant values ​​for the development of man, in a world that is constantly hostile.

Fragment of "Perfection"

"The firmament is curved, compact blue, about the day.

It's rounding

of splendor: noon.

Everything is dome. Rest, unintentionally central, the rose, to a sun in zenith subject.

And so much is the present

that the walking foot feels

the integrity of the planet ”.

Clamor. Tidal wave

Jorge Guillén de Campaspero School. Source: Rastrojo (D • ES), from Wikimedia Commons

Clamor was an edition that comprised three books, Maremágnum being the first. The themes that Guillén dealt with in this work were far from his positive vision of the world, and he focused on the balance of reality and a more logical and methodical evolution of life.

Fragment of "Los unequilos"

"We are the restless men

in society.

We win, we enjoy, we fly.

What a discomfort!

Tomorrow appears between clouds

of a cloudy sky

with wings of archangels-atoms

like an advertisement…

So we live without knowing

if the air is ours.

Maybe we die in the street

maybe in bed… ”.

At the height of the circumstances

It is the third book in the Clamor series. In this work the author reflected his criticism against the world, and protested against the enemies of contemporary life. It was the expression of the man who feels overwhelmed by the convulsion of the place he inhabits, being the main actor in the story.

The writing was also a fight between the positive and the negative, where to rise to the occasion is to insist without being destroyed, and above all to maintain hope and live learning from all the experiences that a universe in chaos supposes.

Fragment of "Blood to the river"

“The blood reached the river.

All the rivers were one blood, and on the roads

of sunny dust

or olive moon

blood ran in a river already muddy

and in the invisible sewers

the bloody stream was humiliated

for everyone's feces…

The crisis screams its word

lie or truth, and his route is opening up history, there greater towards the unknown future, that await hope, conscience

of so many, so many lives ”.

Tribute

This work by Guillén was an explicit literary reflection, as well as cultural, with the particular vision of the author himself. There is in the book the expression of love and the intimate also resurfaces. It was a tribute to the classics of literature.

Fragment of "Candelabra"

"It rises and stands, only, without breaking the silence of the dark, a sound with shape: chandelier.

It barely lights me vague silver

like the nebula in a night

immensity and visible.

I pronounce: candlestick, and outlines, affirms itself towards its stable

grief. Columbro: chandelier…

The word and its bridge

They really take me to the other shore… ”.

Final

It was a reflective work in the last years of the poet's life, where his perception of humanity was much more accentuated. It was also the conclusion of his poetry, reaffirmed through his wishes about the world. Coexistence, the relationship between humans and nature are topics of interest.

The collection of poems was also an investigation into the situation of the author himself within the historical sphere, in nature, the moral and the political. The content was of an ethical nature and a deep analysis of the way people act.

Fragment of "Towards the end"

"We reached the end, to the final stage of an existence.

Will there be an end to my love, to my affections?

They will only conclude

under the sharp decisive blow.

Will there be an end to knowing?

Never never. You are always at the beginning

of an inextinguishable curiosity

in front of infinite life.

Will there be an end to the work?

Of course.

And if you aspire to unity, by the very demand of the whole.

Destination?

No, better: the vocation

more intimate ”.

References

1. Jorge Guillén. Biography. (1991-2019). Spain: Instituto Cervantes. Recovered from: cervantes.es.
2. Jorge Guillén. (2019). Spain: Wikipedia. Recovered from: wikipedia.org.
3. Tamaro, E. (2004-2019). Jorge Guillén. (N / a): Biographies and Lives. Recovered from: biografiasyvidas.com.
4. Diez, F. (2008). Jorge Guillén, poet and professor at the University of Murcia. Spain: Electronic Journal of Philological Studies. Recovered from: um.es.
5. Jorge Guillén. (S. f.). Spain: Spain is Culture. Recovered from: españaescultura.es.