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CAMBRIDGE IBERIAN AND LATIN AMERICAN STUDIES GENERAL EDITOR PROFESSOR P. E. RUSSELL F.B.A. EMERITUS PROFESSOR OF SPANISH STUDIES, THE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD The love poetry of Francisco de Quevedo CAMBRIDGE IBERIAN AND LATIN AMERICAN STUDIES Already published The novels ef Julio Cortazar STEVEN BOLDY, Jo H N ED w ARD s, Christian C6rdoba Emilia Pardo Bazan: the making of a novelist MA URI CE HEMINGWAY, Poverty and welfare in Habsburg Spain: the example ef Toledo LINDA MARTZ, The Krausist movement and ideological change in JUAN L6PEZ-MORILLAS, Spain, 1854-1874 EVELYN s. PROCTER, Curia and Cortes in Le6n and Castile, 1072-1295 A .c • DE c . M • sA u ND ER s, A social history of black slaves and freedmen in Portugal 1441-1555 The fall <if natural man: the American Indian and the growth A. R. D. PAGDEN, ef historical relativism Gald6s and the irorry <if language DIANE F.U REY, Future titles will include ROBERT 1. BURNS, Muslims, Christians and Jews in the crusader kingdom of Valencia The theatre of Valle-Inclan JOHN LYON, The picaresque novel and the point of view FRANCISCO RICO, Calder6n in the German Lands and the Low Countries: his H. M. SULLIVAN, reception and irifl.uence 1654-1980 Thel ovpeo etroyf FrancisdceoQ uevedo An aesthetic and existential study JULIAN OLIVARES, JR UNIVERSITY OF HOUSTON CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS CAMBRIDGE LONDON NEW YORK NEW ROCHELLE MELBOURNE SYDNEY CAMBRIDGEU NIVERSITPYR ESS CambridgNee,wY orkM,e lbourMnaed,r iCda,p eT ownS,i ngapore, SaoP aulDoe,l hDiu,b aiT,ok yo CambridUgnei versPirteys s TheE dinburBguhi ldiCnagm,b ridCgBe2 8 RU,U K Publisihnet dh eU niteSdt atoefsA mericbay C ambridUgnei versPirteys Nse,w Y ork www.cambridge.org Informatioontn h itsi tlwew:w .cambridge.orgl/ 29l27 489085 2 © CambridUgnei versPirteys1 s9 83 Thipsu blicaitsii oncn o pyrigShutb.j etcots tatuteoxrcye ption andt ot hep rovisioofrn esl evcaonltl ecltiicveen saignrge ements, nor eproducotfia onnyp armta yt akpel acwei thotuhtew ritten permissoifoC na mbridUgnei versPirteys s. Firsptu blis1h9e8d3 Thidsi gitaplrliyn tveedr si2o0n0 9 A catalogue record for this publication is available from the British Library Library of Congress Catalogue Card Number: 81-14702 ISBN9 78-0-521-24H3a6r2d-b9a ck ISBN9 78-0-512212-49-P8a perback CambridUgnei versPirteysh sa sn or esponsibfiolrti htepy e rsistoern ce accuraocfyU RLsfo r exteronratl h ird-pianrtteyrn et websitetso i rne ferred thipsu blicatainoddn o,e nso tg uaranttheaeat n yc onteonnts ucwhe bsitiess, orw ilrle maianc,c uraotrae p propriate. To Kathy Contents Preface and acknowledgments IX Introduction 2 The conception of an ideal 18 3 Quevedo and courtly love 50 Quevedo and Petrarch 50 The burden of courtly love 57 Relief through safety valves 65 Dreams, disengafio and death-in-life 74 The absurdity of courtly love 80 4 Quevedo and Neoplatonic love 90 Corporal reaction and irony 90 The pilgrim of love 96 Body and soul 96 5 Love and death 113 Wit and eternal passion I 18 Death, the child of love 122 Baroque defiance 128 6 Conclusion 142 Notes 154 Bibliography 170 Key to poems studied 176 Index 178 vu Preface and Acknowledgments Francisco Gomez de Quevedo y Villegas ( 1580-1645) led an active and turbulent life. He was famous for .his religious and moral prose, his picaresque novel, the Busc6n (The Sharper), and his satirical Suefios (Dreams). Following the practice of the period, he published no books of his own poetry. With the exception of some anthologized poetry, he gained the reputation as a brilliant and provocative poet mainly from the circulation of his poetry in manuscripts. He was a noted _ polemicist and wit, a protean, complex individual both praised and censured. He was a Knight of the Order of Santiago (Stjames), and spent much of his life in the service of His Majesty and royal favorites. In his political activities he made many enemies. He was incarcerated four times, the last contributing to poor health and his death. Most of his poetry was published posthumously in 1648 and 1670. This book studies a corpus of Quevedo's poetry commonly regarded as his serious love poetry. Within this context I have limited the study to sonnets in the range of the High Style, taking into consideration the poet's tendency to blur the distinction by introduc ing into this category 'indecorous' elements. I do not wish to give the impression that I have arranged the sonnets in a chronological sequence. Although valuable work has been done in this regard (J. Crosby, H. Ettinghausen, R. Moore), the dating ofQuevedo's poetry is still far from conclusive. Rather, I have attempted to discover a trajectory of intensity in this love poetry indicating his philosophical concern with, and personal reaction to, courtly love. The term 'existential' in the title is not to be taken as reflecting a modern philosophy or attitude, but as the attempt to see the love poetry, and his involvement with the courtly tradition, as an expression related to the poet's experience and existence. This study is a revised and shortened version of a doctoral dissertation submitted at The University of Texas, Austin, 1977. I IX THE LOVE POETRY OF FRANCISCO DE QUEVEDO wish to acknowledge my gratitude to A. A. Parker for inducing me to write the dissertation on Quevedo and his patient supervision of it, for reading the first draft of the manuscript and his invaluable sugges tions; to my colleague Harold Jones who read a portion of the manuscript and gave me critical assistance; to my wife Kathleen for her diligent reading of the typescript and for assistance in the clarification of stylistic obscurities. A special acknowledgment and thanks go to my friends and colleagues who graciously gave time and effort to the demanding task of translating: to Lenore Padula, Bridgewater State College, and to James A. Anderson, The University ofT exas, Austin, for their assistance in translating parts of Flaminio Nobili's fl trattato dell' amore humano; to the latter again for the translation of Quevedo's prose; and to Bernard P. E. Bentley, University of St Andrew's, for the translation of most of Quevedo's poetry. I also thank Elias L. Rivers, State University of New York, Stony Brook, for allowing me to use the translations of Quevedo from his anthology, and for providing me with the translation of sonnet 45r. My gratitude goes as well to the Ford Foundation Fellowships for Mexican Americans, and to its Director, Arturo Madrid, for the fellowship that allowed me to complete the dissertation; to the National Endowment for the Humanities and to the American Council ofL earned Societies for the grant to revise the dissertation for book publication; and to the University of Houston for the funds to prepare the typescript. I acknowledge the cooperation of the following who gave permission to quote from copyright material: from Gli Asolani by Pietro Bembo, Rudolph B. Gottfried, translator, Indiana University Publications, 1954; excerpts from The Book of the Courtier by Baldesar Castiglione (translated by Charles S. Singleton), copyright © 1959 by Charles S. Singleton and Edgar de N. Mayhew, reprinted by permission of Doubleday & Company, Inc.; from 'Baltasar Gracian's The Mind's Wit and Art,' Leland H. Chambers, translator, Dissertation, University of Michigan, 1962; from Petrarch's Lyric Poems, Robert M. Durling, translator and editor, Harvard University Press, 1976; from Renaissance and Baroque Poetry of Spain, with English Prose Translations, Elias L. Rivers, translator and editor, copyright © 1973 by Elias L. Rivers (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1966), reprinted with the permission of Charles Scribner's Sons. x