As a key figure in existentialism, the French writer significantly influenced the development of intellectual life in Europe after 1945. In his book “The Myth of Sisyphus” (Le mythe de Sisyphe), published in 1942, he developed the philosophy of the absurd. The philosophy of the absurd underlay novels, essays and dramas. Each of his easily read works contains three stages: 1) man is forsaken by God and thrown back on himself 2) his pursuit of happiness over revolt against every form of oppression 3) leading to the realization of the need for human solidarity. As a moralist, he rejected the doctrinal rigor of the existentialism advocated by Jean-Paul Sartre. Furthermore, contrary to Sartre, Albert Camus was a moralist and anti-communist…

Albert Camus was born into poor circumstances on November 7, 1913, the son of an Alsatian farm worker and a Spaniard in Mondovi (Algeria).

Camus was one year old when his father died in World War I. The mother moved to Algiers with the two children. In 1930, as a high school student, Camus suffered his first attack of tuberculosis. More followed. From 1933 to 1936 he studied philosophy at the University of Algiers. In 1933 he married Simone Hié. The marriage was soon dissolved. Camus joined the Communist Party of Algeria and left it a year later (1935). He went on theater tours with the company “Radio-Alger” and founded the “Théâtredu travail” (1935). In 1936 he finished his diploma thesis. In 1937 he was excluded from the state examination for health reasons. He again went on a theatrical tour of Algeria and played amateur roles in classical plays. His work “L’envers et l’endroit” was published and he founded the “Théâtre de l’equipe”. As a journalist, he denounced colonial injustices in Algiers. In 1938 he traveled to Savoy and Florence. The essay “Noces” and the drama “Caligula” were published. He directed “The Brothers Karamazov” by F. M. Dostoyevsky. A year later, in 1939, Camus volunteered for World War II but was turned down due to health problems. The following year he married Francine Faure. Camus was expelled from Algeria and went to Paris as a journalist for the newspaper “Paris-Soir”.

In September 1941 he nevertheless returned to Algeria. In 1942 he joined the “Combat” resistance group in France. The novel “L’étranger” (The Stranger) and the philosophical essay “Le mythe de Sisyphe” (The Myth of Sisyphus) were published. In it, Camus deals with the meaningless and the absurd and achieved literary prestige for the first time. At the end of 1943 Camus worked as an editor at the Gallimard publishing house and published the first “Letter to a German Friend”. In 1943 he became a co-founder of the illegal newspaper “Combat”. In 1944 he made the acquaintance of Jean-Paul Sartre. In 1944 the premiere of the drama “Lemalentendu” (The Misunderstanding) took place in Paris. Camus wrote, among other things, the last “Letter to a German Friend” for the now legal newspaper “Combat” after the withdrawal of the German troops. In 1946 he traveled to America and spoke to American students in New York. In 1947, when the newspaper “Combat” changed hands and political direction, Camus left.

The German premiere of the drama “Caligula” took place and the novel “La peste” (The Plague) was published, which was awarded the “Prize of Critics”. In 1948 and 1949 the dramas “L’étet de siége” (The State of Siege) and “Les justes” (The Just) were published; In “Les justes” Camus dealt with the problem of vigilantism. In 1951 the collection of essays “L’homme révolté” (Man in the Revolt) was published, after which he broke off intensive contact with Sarte after a dispute. A year later, in 1952, Camus resigned from UNESCO because Spain, ruled by Francisco Franko, had been admitted to it. In the same year he broke with Sartre. From 1957 Camus headed the Paris publishing house Gallimard as director. In December 1957, Albert Camus was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature for his “significant literary creation which illuminates with clear-sighted seriousness the problems of human conscience in our time”. In 1959 the premiere of the drama “Les possédés” (The Possessed) took place.

Albert Camus died in a car accident in Villeblevin on January 4, 1960. He was in the middle of working on “Le Premier Homme”, an autobiographical novel about his childhood and early youth as the son of a father he only dimly knew from the stories he told. The novel was published posthumously in 1994 as a fragment.

What does Albert Camus say?

Albert Camus says: “What remains is a fate where only the end is fatal. Aside from that single fatal inevitability of death, all joy or happiness is nothing but freedom. A world remains in which man is the only master.

What is the absurd Camus?

For Camus, the absurd is the expression of the experience of the meaninglessness and contradiction of human existence; there is no longer an absolute being (no God), no overarching meaning. Therefore, man experiences his own existence and the world around him as meaningless.

What did Camus write?

Camu’s two main philosophical works are the essays “The Myth of Sisyphus” (Le Mythe de Sisyphe, 1944) and “Man in Revolt” (L’Homme révolté, 1951). In addition, his philosophy is also reflected in his novels and plays.

How do you pronounce Camus?

Albert Camus (born November 7, 1913 in Mondovi, French North Africa, now Dréan, Algeria; died January 4, 1960 near Villeblevin, France) was a French writer, philosopher and critic of religion. In 1957 he received the Nobel Prize for Literature for his journalistic oeuvre.

When does the plague of Camus take place?

The novel is set in 1940 but is loosely based on a cholera epidemic in 1849, following the French colonization of Algeria. The city of Oran, on the west coast of Algeria, is visited by mysterious events: rats come out of the sewers and die on the streets.

Is Camus an existentialist?

Albert Camus is the second major exponent of French existentialism. In his 1942 book The Myth of Sisyphus (Le mythe de Sisyphe), Camus developed the philosophy of the absurd.

What does Camus mean by freedom?

For Camus, freedom is not to be found metaphysically in human nature, but rather the only way to lead a happy life in an unequal world.

With his verse tragedies, the French dramatist RACINE fulfilled the theoretical claim of classical poetry to adapt tragic events to the moral and social norms of his time by means of spiritualization and exaggeration. He changed the complicated, extremely eloquent Baroque theater by replacing complex intrigues with simple actions on the one hand and reflection and self-knowledge on the other hand by replacing the Baroque technique of surprise.

The French dramatist JEAN RACINE was born on December 22, 1639 in La Ferté-Milon (near Soissons). His father was LOUIS RACINE. The boy attended the Jansenist School of Port-Royal. His humanistic training (intensive study of Greek) was of great importance for the later dramatic work on the renewal of French tragedy. However, RACINE’s debuts on the stage and at court, as well as personal ambition, soon led to a break with the anti-theater Jansenists (1666). Despite some scandals and affairs, his successes brought him the encouragement of NICOLAS BOILEAU-DESPRÉAUX (1636-1711), influential politicians (JEAN-BAPTISTE COLBERT, 1619-1689, a French statesman, founder of mercantilism) and the royal family (King LUDWIG XIV. and his sister-in-law HENRIETTE). In 1673 he became a member of the Académie française. In 1677, after court and theater intrigues, he retired as a playwright, and in the same year he became court historiographer.

Literary work

Already in the first tragedy performed by MOLIÈRE’s actors, “La Thébayde ou les frères ennemis” (1664; German “The Thebais or The Enemy Brothers”), which deals with man’s tragic addiction to his past, RACINE made the effective material for himself Greek mythology. However, the piece received little attention. In “Alexandre le Grand” (1666; German “Alexander the Great”) he flattered the general virtues of LUDWIG XIV with idealized historical material and imitated modern romance with gallant love adventures and a precious style. The final breakthrough came with “Andromaque” (1668; German “Andromache”), the drama inspired by EURIPIDES, HOMER and VERGIL about the events that followed the Trojan War, in which people are no longer at the mercy of the gods, but of their own passions and impulses . Contrary to PIERRE CORNEILLE’s (1606–1684) heroic, strong-willed image of man and aristocratic ethos, faint-hearted egoism, suspicious observation and mutual betrayal of people despairing of themselves. Consequently, he took “Bérénice” (1671; German “Berenike”), the tragedy of a painful, involuntary renunciation of love, as an opportunity to paraphrase his humanistic concept of tragedy as “tristesse majestueuse” (“sublime melancholy”), as mental suffering, which no longer required the theatrical accessories of baroque gothic tragedies. RACINE reacted to criticism of this new concept of tragedy with “Bajazet” (1672; German), a harem tragedy from a contemporary Turkish milieu. In the center of “Iphigénie” (1675; German “Iphigenie”) he placed the ancient idea of ​​human sacrifice, however, for reasons of the contemporary art concept, it was weakened to the suicide of the Eriphile.

With “Phèdre” (1677; German “Phädra”, by F. SCHILLER, see PDF “Jean Racine – Phaedra”), the classic French tragedy once again exhausted all its possibilities: RACINE, based on the material model of EURIPIDES, designed the proclaimed by Jansenism uncontrollable predetermination of man psychologically convincing in perfect Alexandrians. The last two plays, which RACINE wrote for the students of Saint-Cyr at the suggestion of the religiously strict MADAME DE MAINTENON, take up biblical material (“Esther”, 1689, German; “Athalie”, 1691, publicly performed 1716; German “Athalja” ).

RACINE also wrote a comedy based on ARISTOPHANES, “Les plaideurs” (1669; German “The process addicts”), which proved him to be a gifted satirist, as well as courtly and spiritual poetry (“Cantiques spirituels”, 1694; German “Geistliche Geistliche Gesänge”) and the treatise justifying Jansenism “Abrégé de l’histoire de Port-Royal” (created between 1695 and 1699, published 1742; German “Outline of the History of Port-Royal”).

Classic poetry

With his five-act verse tragedies, RACINE fulfilled the theoretical claim of classical poetry to adapt tragic events to the moral and social norms of his time by means of spiritualization and exaggeration. He transformed the complicated, extremely eloquent Baroque theater by replacing complex intrigues with simple actions on the one hand, and reflection and self-knowledge on the other hand by replacing Baroque techniques of surprise; he compensated for the reduction in vocabulary (unusual words, neologisms and the like were not permitted in the language rules laid down by the Académie française) with language rich in symbols and allusions and the increased use of non-verbal means (mimicry, gestures, eloquent silence). In an era marked by Christian instincts and courtly self-control, RACINE (like B. PASCAL and the moralists) portrayed the human being in the wheelwork of himself. In this way he succeeded in conveying more tragic feelings on stage instead of moral instruction.

Works (selection)

“La Thébayde ou les frères ennemis” (1664; German “The Thebais or The hostile brothers”)
“Alexandre le Grand” (1666; German “Alexander the Great)
“Andromaque” (1668; German “Andromache”)
“Britannicus” (1670)
“Mithridates” (1673; German “Mithridates”)
“Bérénice” (1671; German “Berenike”)
“Bayazet” (1672)
“Iphigénie” (1675; German “Iphigenia”)
“Phèdre” (1677; German “Phädra”, by F. Schiller)
“Esther” (1689)
“Athalie”, (1691, publicly performed 1716; German “Athalja”)
Oeuvres edited by P. Mesnard, 10 volumes (reissued 1873–90);
Oeuvres complètes edited by R. Picard, 2 vols. (re-edited 1980–81);
Théâtre complet, edited by J. Morel (1980).
Dramas translated by A. Luther and others, 2 vols. (1961–62).

What is Jean Racine known for?

Jean Racine, in full Jean-Baptiste Racine, (baptized December 22, 1639, La Ferté-Milon, France—died April 21, 1699, Paris), French dramatic poet and historiographer renowned for his mastery of French classical tragedy.

What did Jean Racine write?

Racine was primarily a tragedian, producing such “examples of neoclassical perfection” as Phèdre, Andromaque, and Athalie. He did write one comedy, Les Plaideurs, and a muted tragedy, Esther for the young. Racine’s plays displayed his mastery of the dodecasyllabic (12 syllable) French alexandrine.

How do you pronounce Jean Racine?

Neil Gaiman, born in Hampshire, UK in 1960, discovered his love of books as a child. In addition to Tolkien, he devoured Edgar Allan Poe, Ursula K. Le Guin or C.S. Lewis. He worked as a journalist and wrote, among other things, a biography about the author of “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy”, Douglas Adams.

However, his real career aspiration had always been to be a comic book writer, which he was able to do in the 1980s together with the draftsman Dave McKean. The team produced several very successful comic series – in 1991, Gaiman received the first literary prize for “Sandman” that a comic had ever received. In the early 1990s he moved to the USA and concentrated more on writing novels. Screenplays, song lyrics and poems are also part of his work. Gaiman has four children, is married and lives near Minneapolis.

Novels and Comics by Neil Gaiman:

Neil Gaiman is a cross-genre writer, although primarily at home in the fantasy, who writes for readers of all ages. His comic series, above all “Sandman”, received a lot of international attention, the F.A.Z. called it “one of the most important graphic novels” ever. In his comics he sets lovable characters in intelligently constructed stories. The author doesn’t like to stick to one genre when it comes to his novels. The theme is often fantastic, but the tone can be quite different. A Good Omen, for example, written in collaboration with Terry Pratchett, is a satirical and humorous tale about the struggle between good and evil. His children’s literature, on the other hand, is considered rather gloomy and difficult to access for the target group.

Neil Gaiman should be known to many series fans: Among other things, he wrote two episodes for Doctor Who and adapted the Japanese animated series “Princess Mononoke” for the English-speaking market. In 2017, American Gods, a television series based on Gaiman’s novel of the same name, received very positive reviews. “Neverland”, on the other hand, was first a (mini)series before the author expanded the story into a novel. Neil Gaiman’s style is characterized by surprising turns, frequent excursions into (mainly Norse) mythology, unconventional ideas, and a skilful alternation between dark-dramatic and tragically comic scenes. The author has received several awards for his works, including the coveted Hugo Award, one of the most important prizes in science fiction literature.

What is Neil Gaiman best known for?

Gaiman is the New York Times bestselling author of the novels Neverwhere (1995), Stardust (1999), the Hugo and Nebula Award-winning American Gods (2001), Anansi Boys (2005), and Good Omens (with Terry Pratchett, 1990), as well as the short story collections Smoke and Mirrors (1998) and Fragile Things (2006).

What makes Neil Gaiman unique?

In essence, Gaiman is a chameleon, his writing style adhering to whatever story he’s trying to tell. Moreover, Gaiman’s works are character-driven. It can sometimes be difficult to pick out a distinct plot because it’s so dependent on what the characters say and do.

What is Neil Gaiman’s best selling book?

With over 800,000 ratings, “American Gods” is the most popular Neil Gaiman book amongst Goodreads reviewers. In this fantastical tale woven with ancient and modern legends, Shadow meets a fascinating man named Mr.

How did Neil Gaiman get popular?

Gaiman began his career as a journalist in England writing biographical accounts of pop culture figures. In 1989, he launched the groundbreaking The Sandman comics series (1989-1996, 2013-2015), which became one of the founding and best-selling titles for DC Comic’s adult-themed imprint, Vertigo (1993-2020).

Does Neil Gaiman believe in God?

Gaiman says that he is not a Scientologist, and that like Judaism, Scientology is his family’s religion. About his personal views, Gaiman has stated, “I think we can say that God exists in the DC Universe. I would not stand up and beat the drum for the existence of God in this universe.

Is Neil Gaiman for adults?

Neil Gaiman is an author that has published books both for adults and children. Some of his works that are most popular with adults include American Gods and Good Omens. However, his children’s literature is also ageless and timeless which means that adults can enjoy them too.

What should I read if I like Neil Gaiman?

Joan Aiken.
Tracey Baptiste.
Silvia Moreno-Garcia.
Theodora Goss.
N.K. Jameson.
Carmen Maria Machado.
Nnedi Okorafor.
Vandana Singh.

What is a meaningful quote from Neil Gaiman?

Life is always going to be stranger than fiction, because fiction has to be convincing, and life doesn’t. Things need not have happened to be true. Tales and adventures are the shadow truths that will endure when mere facts are dust and ashes and forgotten.

The French writer is considered one of the most important novelists in world literature. Honoré de Balzac is the founder of the sociological novel in which people, milieu and social classes are described. This is what his main work “La Comédie Humaine” (1829-1854), in German “The Human Comedy”, which has remained in fragments, stands for. His works are characterized by precise observation, analytical mind and exact description, which gives an apt picture of the restoration society. Balzac was an extraordinarily prolific writer with an emphasis on the novelist. In 20 years he created almost 100 novels and various essays, short stories and dramas…

Honoré de Balzac was born in Tours on May 20, 1799, the son of a lawyer.

Balzac had an unhappy childhood. In the first four years of his life he was cared for by a wet nurse. From the age of 7 to 14 he attended a strict convent school in Vendôme. Until 1816 he lived in Paris in a boarding school. At his father’s request, Balzac began studying law in Paris in 1816. He earned his living as a clerk in a lawyer’s office. But he dropped out of college to make a living as a writer. He published his first trivial novels under various pseudonyms, which, however, remained without public effect. They earned him a meager living.

At the age of 23 he met the 45-year-old Madame de Berny, who remained his maternal lover for years and who influenced his work. In 1827 he gave up his work as a publisher and print shop owner due to bankruptcy. He only got rid of the resulting debts shortly before his death. Two years later, in 1829, the first literary success came with the work “Physiologie du Mariage”, in English “Physiology of Marriage”. However, the cynicism expressed in it and his rational view of marriage were received as offensive. His novel “Le dernier Chuons ou la Bretagne en 1800” (1829), which was nevertheless crowned with success, was also understood as a nuisance “La Comédie Humaine” was ranked.

This also brought about the notoriety of Honoré de Balzac, who ennobled himself in 1829. In 1832 he ran unsuccessfully for the French Parliament and in 1848 and 1849 for the Académie Française. From 1832 Balzc had a lively correspondence with the Polish Countess Evelina Hanska-Rzewuska. Shortly before his death in 1850 and after only brief personal encounters, they married. Balzac was an extraordinarily prolific writer with an emphasis on the novelist. In 20 years he created almost 100 novels and various essays, short stories and dramas. Balzac’s literary work is considered a realistic depiction of society in the Restoration period. Its characteristic is the people and their milieu described with an analytical mind. In this, Balzac distinguishes himself as an exact observer.

The 91 works published between 1829 and 1850 are summarized in his main cyclical work “La Comédie Humaine”. In an introduction, he justifies this key work with his idea that the human types can be divided in relation to their social characters, just as there are species in the animal kingdom. He drew on the ideas of the scientist Jean Baptiste de Lamarck and the philosopher Étienne Geoffroy Saint-Hilaires. Balzac intended, as he once put it, to “carry a whole world in one’s head”. He paid particular attention to how chance and the human spirit work together in social connections. “La Comédie Humaine” is divided into moral, philosophical and analytical studies.

The studies of manners contain most of the already completed novels, in which Parisian citizens, country life, military, province, private life and politics are discussed. For his main work, Balzac planned to characterize 2,000 figures from different social classes – from nobility to criminals. Ultimately, the work was never finished – it was planned to have 135 pieces – but Balzac was able to fulfill two-thirds of his project, in which he accommodated 90 novels and short stories in it. All works are characterized by the excellent description of the individual types and the milieu studies.

The best-known novels include “Eugénie Grandet” (1833), La Recherche de l”absolu (1834), dt. “The Search for the Absolute”, “Le Père Goriot” (1834-1835), dt “Father Goriot”, “Illusions Perdues” (1837-1843), in German “Lost Illusions”, or “La Cousine Bette” (1846), in German “Cousin Lisbeth”. Honoré de Balzac was already very popular with readers and critics during his lifetime. He was a role model for many subsequent French novelists. The naturalists in particular, with their experimental style of writing, appropriated Balzac’s sociological-realistic approach. Some of his works found their way into film art, such as “Eugénie Grandet”.

His other important works include “La Peau de chagrin” (1831), in German “The Chagrin Leather”, “Le Lys dans la vallée” (1835-1836), in German “The Lily in the Valley”, ” César Birotteau” (1834-1837), “Le Curé de village” (1839), in German “The country priest”, the stories “Contes drolatiques” (1832, 1833 and 1837), in German “Toddler stories”, the Drama “Vautrin” (1839) and his correspondence with Evelina Hanska-Rzewuska, “Lettres à l”étrangère” published posthumously in 1906.

Honoré de Balzac died in Paris on August 18, 1850.

What should one read of Balzac?

The most beautiful works of Balzac in thoroughly revised translations and with competent introductions. Seven novels: ‘The Talisman or The Shagreen Leather’, ‘Father Goriot’, ‘Eugénie Grandet’, ‘Lost Illusions’, ‘Glory and Misery of the Courtesans’, ‘Vetter Pons or The Two Musicians’, ‘Tante Lisbeth’.

How many works does Honoré de Balzac’s human comedy include?

The human comedy includes both essays and realistic novels, short stories, short stories, 25 unfinished works but also 8 early works written between 1822 and 1825. By the time of his death, Balzac had completed 91 of the 137 novels and stories in his entirety.

How did Honore de Balzac die?

Date of death: August 18, 1850

Where is Balzac?

Located in the heart of the former village of Passy, the Maison de Balzac is the only Parisian residence of the writer that has survived to this day. In this house on the slopes of Passy, Balzac wrote his “Comédie humaine”.

Who wrote the human comedy?

Honoré de Balzac

When did Honore de Balzac die?

Place of death: Paris, France

The son of a Chilean railroad worker rose to become a recognized poet and diplomat, not only among the Chilean people. With his love poems and stories, Pablo Neruda knew in a unique way how to combine poetry and politics into an impressive work with universal significance for a global mass audience. In 1971, the life’s work of the diplomat and poet was crowned by the award of the Nobel Prize for Literature…

Neftalí Ricardo Reyes Basoalto was born on July 12, 1904 in the small town of Parral in southern Chile.

His father was a railroad worker. He lost his mother soon after his birth. Neruda grew up in Temuco, where he roamed the woods, befriended the Native Americans, and secretly began writing poetry. In 1919 he published his first poems in magazines, signing “Pablo Neruda”. In 1921, Neruda moved to the capital, Santiago, to attend teacher’s college there. In 1924, at the age of 20, he published the collection of poems “Veinte poemas de amor y una canción desesperada”, with which he first made a name for himself as an author of love poems.

Neruda then began to work as a translator and journalist for newspapers. He also published short stories and poems. In 1927 Neruda was appointed Honorary Consul of Chile to Rangoon, Burma (Myanmar). In 1930 he was appointed Consul of the Dutch East Indies. He married the Dutch Maria Antonieta Haagenar. In 1933/34 he took on diplomatic functions, first in Buenos Aires, then in Barcelona and Madrid. He processed the new impressions on such different continents in his three-volume collection of poems “Residencia en la tierra” (1933-1947). In Madrid, Neruda separated from his first wife to later marry Delia del Carril.

When his colleague and friend Federico García Lorca was murdered by the fascists in the course of the conflicts at the beginning of the Spanish civil war, the Chilean writer began to become increasingly politicized. After his return home, Neruda supported the struggle of the Spanish republicans from there in 1937/38. He began work on his major work “Canto general” (1950). In 1945 he was elected to the Senate of Chile. He joined the Communist Party and won the National Literature Prize. In the course of the anti-communist repression in Chile, Neruda had to go into hiding in 1948/49 and then flee to Mexico.

Although he was now celebrated all over the world, he was not able to return to Chile until 1952. In 1955, Neruda separated from Carril to live with Matilde Urrutia. He continued to travel extensively, taking him to the Soviet Union, China and South America. In the late 1960s Neruda also wrote for the theatre, for which he wrote Spanish translations of William Shakespeare. He also worked on his autobiography “Confieso que he vivido: Memorias”, which was published posthumously in 1974.

At the beginning of the 1970s, Neruda gave up his own candidacy in the Chilean presidential elections in order to support his friend Salvador Allende. He was then sent by the government as ambassador to France. In 1971 the life’s work of the diplomat and poet was crowned by the award of the Nobel Prize for Literature. Due to illness, he returned to Chile in 1972, where he still had to live through the assassination of Allende and the accession to power of the dictator Augusto Pinochet.

Pablo Neruda died on September 23, 1973 in a hospital in Santiago (Chile).

What is Pablo Neruda best known for?

Pablo Neruda, original name Neftalí Ricardo Reyes Basoalto, (born July 12, 1904, Parral, Chile—died September 23, 1973, Santiago), Chilean poet, diplomat, and politician who was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1971. He was perhaps the most important Latin American poet of the 20th century.

How did Pablo Neruda impact the world?

Neruda’s poetry directly influenced a great number of South American writers, Gabriel Garcia-Marquez, Julio Cortazar, and Isabel Allende among them. Neruda won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1971, a controversial award because of his support of Stalin and his long-standing communist sympathies.

What type of poem is Pablo Neruda most famous?

Besides his epic romantic poetry, Neruda was famous for writing many different odes to foods and objects.

What type of poem is Pablo Neruda famous for and why?

Neruda became known as a poet when he was 13 years old, and wrote in a variety of styles, including surrealist poems, historical epics, overtly political manifestos, a prose autobiography, and passionate love poems such as the ones in his collection Twenty Love Poems and a Song of Despair (1924).

What are Pablo Neruda’s poems about?

Neruda wrote in a variety of styles such as erotically charged love poems as in his collection Twenty Poems of Love and a Song of Despair, surrealist poems, historical epics, and overtly political manifestos.

What is the tone of Pablo Neruda’s poem?

The tone is loving, but also incredulous, and a bit melancholy. “Every Day You Play” is a poem of love in which the poet praises his lover for accepting him with all his faults.

What is the central theme of the poem every day you play by Pablo Neruda?

‘Every Day You Play’ by Pablo Neruda describes the overwhelming love a speaker has for the listener and the way his life is improved by their relationship. The poem begins with the speaker describing how his love has elevated the listener beyond all others.

The most famous and translated Andalusian poet is undoubtedly Federico García Lorca. You may have heard his name before, but you’ve probably never read anything by him or seen him at the theater.

Federico García Lorca – biography, poems, plays

Lorca’s confrontation with the Spanish traditions of his time, interspersed with surrealistic elements, as well as Lorca’s importance for Spaniards in our time is difficult for Germans to understand. Not only because his poetry can only be insufficiently translated from Spanish into German, but also because probably only a Spanish native speaker can emotionally understand and appreciate the poet’s eloquence and cultural background.

In 1898 the Spanish world empire came to an end with the lost war against the USA over Cuba and Spain was gripped by a deep crisis of national identity, which culminated in the horror of the Spanish Civil War in 1936. The far too short life of Federico García Lorca took place between these two catastrophes.

Lorca was born and raised in Fuente Vaqueros near Granada in 1898. His father was a wealthy farmer and his mother a village schoolteacher, who sparked Federico’s interest in music and literature. In 1909 the family moved to a beautiful town house in Granada, where Federico attended high school. He then wanted to study music, but chose law on his father’s advice. Philosophy and Literature from the University of Granada. Here he came into contact with Andalusian poets and undertook study trips with Martín Domínguez Berrueta, a professor of literature and art. Lorca read works by the Russian anarchist Kropotkin and the German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche.

In 1918 Lorca published his first volume of poetry, Impresiones y paisajes (Impressions and Landscapes). His father financed the printing of his first work. Lorca was a fan of Shakespeare, Goethe, as well as Spanish poet Antonio Machado and Nicaraguan writer Rubén Dario.

In 1919 Lorca moved to the University of Madrid. The painter Salvador Dalí and the later filmmaker Luis Buñuel also studied there, with whom a close friendship developed. In 1921 Lorca published a second volume of poetry and joined the Madrid theater scene. His first theatrical production, El maleficio de la mariposa (The Bewitchment of the Butterfly), was about a love story between a butterfly and a cockroach, but was not a hit with audiences.

Lorca suddenly became famous in 1928 with the book of poems Romancero Gitano (Gypsy Romances). As a homosexual, Lorca was on the fringes of society and felt drawn to the Gypsies (Gitanos), who were also a socially outlawed group and were harassed by the Guardia Civil.

In 1929 the friendship with Dalí and Buñuel broke up, both of whom moved to Paris. There are indications that Lorca’s only hidden homosexuality was the reason for the quarrel with Dalí. Other sources report that Lorca was appalled by the first surrealist film, Un chien andalou (An Andalusian Dog), which Buñuel and Dalí shot and screened in Paris. The film shows a man cutting through the eye of a woman sitting in front of him with a razor.

The break with friends led to depression in Lorca. Therefore, his father sent him to New York, where Lorca witnessed the stock market crash on Wall Street in October 1929, which he addressed in his work Poeta en Nueva York. In 1930 Lorca traveled on to Cuba, where he was celebrated for his volume of poetry Romancero Gitano. He wrote to his parents: »Don’t forget that in America there is more to a poet than to a prince in Europe«.

When Lorca returned to Granada in June 1930, the king had abdicated and the republic had been proclaimed, and Lorca soon championed its democratic goals. The government appointed him director of the Teatro Universitario La Barraca. This student traveling theater should bring the culture to the simple rural population. Back then, 50% of Spaniards were illiterate. So Lorca brought the Spanish classics like Cervantes or Lope de Vega to the villages. In 1933 he published his most famous play, Bodas de Sangre (The Blood Wedding), with which he had great success at Madrid’s Teatro Beatriz. From 1933 to early 1934, Lorca traveled to Argentina and Uruguay. The American premiere of Blood Wedding took place in Buenos Aires in October. There Lorca became friends with the Chilean poet Pablo Neruda.

On his return to Madrid in January 1934, Lorca found a chaotic political situation. The conservatives had won the election, left and right fought each other on the streets. Lorca put his signature at the head of an appeal for the salvation of the Spanish Republic and signed several anti-fascist manifestos. In 1934 Lorca’s play Yerma was staged at Madrid’s Theatro Español. In 1935 Lorca had reached the peak of its popularity. Romancero Gitano became the best-selling book of poetry of the century.

By the summer of 1936, Lorca had finished his play La Casa de Bernarda Alba and was traveling to his parents’ country house to relax. There he was surprised by General Franco’s putsch. Three days after the start of the Spanish Civil War, the putschists occupied Granada. Lorca took shelter at friends’ house in Granada. Although their sons were leaders in the Granada Falange, which was loyal to Franco, they could not prevent Lorca from being arrested by the putschists, deported to Víznar and shot on August 19, 1936 along with two other republicans and buried on the side of the road.

The location of the grave is still unknown to this day. After the execution, one of the killers boasted that he “shot him twice in the ass because he was gay.” The death of the poet, who was popular across all political camps, was always embarrassing for the Franco regime. There were numerous attempts to reinterpret the murder as a war-related “misdemeanor” or even as a vendetta among homosexuals.

During the Franco dictatorship, Lorca’s work was banned in Spain. The brutal assassination of Lorca, on the other hand, raised his profile around the world and gave him the unjustified reputation of being the quintessential Spanish political poet. In fact, Lorca has always avoided politics. He once declared: I am revolutionary because every real poet is revolutionary. But politically, I will never be! He also refused to be politically co-opted by the communists.

Notes on the work of Federico Garcia Lorca

In Spain, Lorca belonged to the »Generation of 27« group of poets. Their other members are almost unknown in Germany, so I will not go into further details here. The group endeavored to bring Spanish poetry closer to European modernity, although it was always important to Lorca not to break the connection to Spanish traditions. The “hunt for the bold metaphor” was the main stylistic feature of the group of poets. In contrast to earlier periods of poetry, the metaphor should not be used as decoration, but as the substance of poetry. With a metaphor, the actual term is replaced by a term from a completely different context of meaning, which should sound more descriptive and linguistically more interesting. For example, the word camel could be replaced by the term desert ship. The most striking thing that the poets of Generation von 27 have in common is free verse form and the absence of rhymes. The group felt inspired by the fame that other Spanish artists and great thinkers of the 1920s had already achieved, such as Picasso, Miró, Ortega y Gasset or Manuel de Falla. He had a deep friendship with de Falla, since Lorca actually wanted to study music. With him he often visited the Alpujarras south of Granada, where they studied folk tunes.

Lorca was influenced by Ramón Gómez de la Serna, considered a prophet of the avant-garde in Spain. Serna circulated the first translations of the manifestos of the Futurists and DADAists in Spain. He created the concept of Gregueria. By this he understood the combination of humor plus metaphor. Here’s an example: “The zoo is something of a lunatic asylum for animals.” Lorca embodied the center of this movement. He wasn’t the type of poet who withdraws more than anyone else, but the type who makes the most connections.

In a lecture, Lorca described the mainspring of his poetry using the terms muse, demon and angel in art: »Angel and muse come from outside; the angel bestows talent, the muse form… But the demon must be aroused in the last dwellings of blood… a mental wind that persistently blows over the heads of the dead, in search of new landscapes and unfamiliar accents.«

Lorca believed that modern metaphor had the ability “to merge sensory impressions, to reverse cause and effect, to blur the real, to personify objects and inanimate beings.” Lorca lived out this type of modern metaphor in his volume of poetry Romancero gitano. Here is the example Reyerta (dispute):

“In the crown of an olive tree two ancient women weep,
during this fight the bull rears up against the walls
Black angels brought cloth, water from melted snow –
Angels with mighty wings made entirely of Albaceter knives.”

Through his friendship with Salvador Dalí, Lorca also introduced surrealistic elements into his poetry, particularly in the poetry collection Poeta en Nueva York, which was only published after his death in 1940. Also here is an excerpt:

»On the terrace I fought with the moon.
Swarms of windows pierced one leg of the night.
Heaven’s gentle cows drank from my eyes.
And on Broadway’s panes gray as ash,
pounded the breezes with very long wings.”

Lorca’s plays were mostly about how the will for freedom and the longing for modernity are hindered by the rigid Spanish traditions. He processed this topic in the trilogy trilogía de tragedias rurales, which consists of the plays Bodas de Sangre, Yerma and La Casa de Bernarda Alba. It is always about a woman who marries or is about to marry the man her parents have chosen for her and an extramarital relationship with a man whom the woman really loves. In the end there is usually the death of the woman or the rival.

From today’s German point of view, it seems a bit kitschy and unworldly, but in Lorca’s time it inspired the Spanish audience because it obviously reflected the reality of their lives.

In 1935 Lorca wrote his last drama, which he called Comedia sin título (untitled comedy). The play was intended to be in three acts but was left unfinished with just one act and was first performed in 1989 at the Teatro Maria Guerrero in Madrid. In this work, Lorca mixed performers and audience. It is also Lorca’s most political play, with references to Bertolt Brecht.

In his last years Lorca worked on the book of poetry Diván del Tamarit. Love and death are the dominant themes. The work was intended as a homage to the Arabic traditions of Andalusia. Due to the beginning of the Spanish Civil War, it was no longer published. Lorca’s sister Concha saved the manuscript. His exiled brother Francisco García Lorca published the work in New York in 1940.

Here is the example »The Surprising Love« (Gacela del amor imprevisto) from the poetry collection Diván del Tamarit:

No one understood the dark magnolia scent on your stomach.
Nobody knew that between your teeth you were torturing a hummingbird of love to death.
A thousand little Persian horses slept in the square in the moonlight of your forehead,
while I clasped your waist, enemy of snow, for four nights.

Between plaster and jasmine your gaze was a pale twig with seeds.
I sought, as a gift for you, in my breast the ivory letters that forever, forever,
mean forever: garden of my torment,

your body forever fleeting, the blood from your veins in my mouth,
your mouth already lightless to my death.

In 1934, the Jewish advertising executive Heinrich Enrique Beck fled from the Nazis to Spain. There he met Lorca and, with the help of a Swiss lawyer, Beck managed to acquire the German translation rights for Lorca’s complete works. Beck was not a gifted translator, but in Germany his heirs managed to ensure that only Beck’s translations were allowed to appear until Suhrkamp Verlag put an end to this through a court decision, so that more professional translations could appear from around 1996. So if you want to read a translated work of Lorca, first check who translated it.

Why was Federico García Lorca so important?

In a career spanning just 19 years, Federico García Lorca resurrected and revitalized the most basic strains of Spanish poetry and helped inaugurate a second Golden Age of the Spanish theater.

What is Federico García Lorca’s most famous poem?

‘Ballad of the Moon, The Moon’ (from Gypsy Ballads, 1928) The poems of Lorca’s most famous collection explore the life and culture of Andalusian Gypsies, a people that Lorca was fascinated by and about whom he wrote with deep understanding.

Why was Federico Garcia assassinated?

García Lorca was assassinated by Nationalist forces at the beginning of the Spanish Civil War. His remains have never been found, and the motive remains in dispute; some theorize he was targeted for being gay, a socialist, or both, while others view a personal dispute as the more likely cause.

What were Lorca’s poems about?

Lorca published numerous volumes of poetry during his career, beginning with Impresiones y paisajes (1918). His lyrical work often incorporates elements of Spanish folklore, Andalusian flamenco and Gypsy culture, and cante jondos, or deep songs, while exploring themes of romantic love and tragedy.

Who is the best Spanish poet?

Rosario Castellanos.
Pablo Neruda.
Federico Garcia Lorca.
Octavio Paz.
Lope de Vega.
Gustavo Adolfo Becquer.
Jose Marti.
Jorge Luis Borges.

What is the literary style of Federico García Lorca?

In his early years, García Lorca’s poetry was marked by the Spanish Modernismo style—a style of particularly overwrought, melodramatic Romanticism—as well as by the Surrealism of Spanish artists such as Salvador Dali, with whom he collaborated closely.

He came from an artistic family and experienced classical culture as lively and fruitful. Without breaking with tradition, Boris Pasternak became one of the most important poets of the young Soviet Union. His great novel “Doctor Zhivago” led to a scandal. Pasternak was born in Moscow 125 years ago.

“A tall, gray-haired man stood in the open front door and enthusiastically waved, ‘Come in! Come in!’ He gestured with both arms and laughed at me as I walked down the snowy path through his garden. This poet Boris Pasternak, who has been living in seclusion on the outskirts of Moscow for 20 years, is not a bitter man. He is an optimist, a deeply religious person who believes in life and in the power of life, which will always be stronger than theories and dogmas.”

So the ARD correspondent Gerd Ruge in 1958 in a radio report about Boris Pasternak. When the journalist visits the poet in Moscow, he has just published his novel “Doctor Zhivago” in western countries and is now facing massive hostilities from the Soviet party press. He had to refuse the Nobel Prize for Literature under threats of being deprived of his citizenship.

Boris Pasternak was born in Moscow on February 10, 1890. The son of a well-known painter and a celebrated pianist, he grew up in an intellectual, highly cultured milieu. Guests of the house were Leo Tolstoy, Rainer Maria Rilke and the composer Alexander Scriabin, who promoted Pasternak’s musical talent and praised his first compositions.

Source of inspiration futurism

The music remained an episode, however, because the multi-talented artist went to Marburg in 1912 to study philosophy before encountering modern poetry led him to his true calling, as Susanne Frank, Professor of East Slavic Literatures at Berlin’s Humboldt University, explains :

“Futurism was actually a first, very important stage, it was very, very inspired by Mayakovsky in the 10s, and then, inspired by the Futurist poems, tried to write it himself. But it wasn’t really futuristic because it wasn’t experimental enough, not blatantly experimental.”

He finds his very own tone with the volume “My Sister, Life”. The collection was created in the summer of 1917 between the February uprising and the October revolution, but was only published in 1922 after the turmoil of the civil war. Full of bold imagery, these poems met with critical and public acclaim:

A muggy night
“It trickled, but stood still
The grasses in the storm sack,
The dust just swallowed it into pills
Iron naked in soft powder.
There was no hope of finding salvation
The village poppies was like fainting deep.
The rye burned in flames,
God swelled in rash, fevered.”

During the years of Stalinist terror, Pasternak made a living from translating foreign-language literature. Thus he strives for poetry from the Caucasus, that almost mythical region that played such an important role in classical Russian literature of the 19th century:

“He translated many German classics into Russian, English classics too, but he also translated Georgian poetry, contemporary Georgian poetry, into Russian by authors who fell victim to Stalinism shortly afterwards. And with his preoccupation with Georgia, also in his own poetry, for example in his poetry cycle “Waves”, he made a significant contribution to continuing to work on Georgia as a region of Russian literature in the tradition of Pushkin, Tolstoy and Lermontov.”

From 1947 Pasternak worked on his great revolutionary novel. “Doctor Shiwago”, in many ways an autobiographical figure, proclaims Pasternak’s religiously colored idea of ​​life that is larger than time-bound political ideologies. Zhivago’s death is emblematic: he suffers a heart attack while attempting to breathe fresh air through the tightly closed windows of a Moscow tram. Because the novel was not published despite Khrushchev’s thaw policy, Pasternak gave it to an Italian publisher. The smear campaign that followed hit the poet, who has never openly opposed the party dictatorship, hard. Boris Pasternak died in May 1960. He was rediscovered in Russia only as society opened up in the late 1980s:
“In perestroika, of course, Pasternak was very important. His novel was published in 1988, at a time when not only Pasternak, but many other authors, such as Mandelstam, were really being discovered in the last years of the Soviet Union. And since then, of course, he has had the status of a classic, he is now an integral part of Russian literary history.”

What is Pasternak known for?

Boris Leonidovich Pasternak, (born January 29 [February 10, New Style], 1890, Moscow, Russia—died May 30, 1960, Peredelkino, near Moscow), Russian poet whose novel Doctor Zhivago helped win him the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1958 but aroused so much opposition in the Soviet Union that he declined the honour.

Why did Pasternak refused Nobel Prize?

When it was announced that Boris Pasternak had been awarded the 1958 Nobel Prize, he was forced to decline it at the behest of Soviet authorities, who had banned his novel Doctor Zhivago.

Did Boris Pasternak win the Nobel Prize?

This year’s Nobel Prize for Literature has been awarded by the Swedish Academy to the Soviet-Russian writer Boris Pasternak for his notable achievement in both contemporary poetry and the field of the great Russian narrative tradition.

Why was Dr Zhivago banned in Russia?

The novel is named after its protagonist, Yuri Zhivago, a physician and poet, and takes place between the Russian Revolution of 1905 and World War II. Owing to the author’s independent-minded stance on the October Revolution, Doctor Zhivago was refused publication in the USSR.

What does Pasternak mean in Russian?

Pasternak or Pasternack means parsnip, Pastinaca sativa, in Polish, Romanian, Russian, Ukrainian, and Yiddish.

Where does the name Pasternak come from?

Polish Ukrainian Rusyn (in Slovakia spelled mainly Pasternák) and Jewish (eastern Ashkenazic); Slovak (Pasternák): from Polish Ukrainian Rusyn and eastern Yiddish pasternak ‘parsnip’ (via Middle High German from Latin pastinaca) apparently a nickname or in the case of the Jewish surname an artificial name.

With the novel “Ulysses” (1922), the Anglo-Irish writer created the most radical translation of Homer’s “Odyssey” and one of the most important novels of the modern age, which also established his reputation as a literary genius. His psychologically differentiated portrayal and his innovative literary techniques made him the most important author in the language and time of the 20th century alongside Marcel Proust and Robert Musil. In his work, James Joyce dealt with symbolism and realism, which he later combined in a synthesis. Joyce worked with experimental language and the development of the so-called “stream-of-consciousness technique” (stream of consciousness technique or simultaneous style)…

James Augustine Aloysius Joyce was born in Dublin on February 2, 1882.

Raised in poverty as the first child of John Stanislaus Joyce and Mary Jane Murray, his parents wanted him to become a priest. He therefore attended several Jesuit schools before studying philosophy and languages ​​at University College Dublin. Then he turned away from the Roman Catholic Church. Under the pretext of wanting to study medicine and natural sciences, he moved to Paris in 1902. Here he first came into contact with the literature of symbolism and realism, but soon got into financial difficulties, so that he returned to Dublin in 1903. Here he first worked as a private tutor.

In 1904 he met Nora Barnacle, whom he married in London on July 4, 1931. Together they became parents to two children, George (1905-1976) and Lucia (1907-1982). The family then lived in Pula, Trieste, Zurich, Paris and London. Meanwhile, Joyce earned his living with various jobs, including as a journalist and language teacher at Berlitz schools. In 1913 he met the writer Ezra Pound (1885-1972). Joyce’s literary work consisted of only a few books and a few poems. Harriet Shaw Weaver became one of the most important patrons in those years. He was also dependent on the financial support of his brother Stanislaus.

The novel “Ulysses” (1922) then established his reputation as a literary genius. The title was the most radical translation of the Homeric “Odyssey” in the language and time of the 20th century. His labyrinthine novels contained different levels of relationships, which revealed several principles. Each episode has been assigned a body organ, a symbol, and a science. The novel was ostensibly the epic of his native Dublin on June 16, 1904, the day he met Nora Barnacle. Joyce fans later celebrated this day as “Bloomsday”.

Even before his work was published, the novel was banned in England, Ireland and the USA due to obscenities. The owner of the Shakespeare & Co. bookshop, Sylvia Beach, published a first censored edition in the same year. The first complete edition was not published until 1958, posthumously. In his second significant novel success “Finnegans Wake” (1923) he tried to describe a dreamed world history in a conglomerate of different languages. Almost blind due to his eye disease, he underwent eye surgery in 1930. In 1939 the first complete version of his novel Finnegans Wake was published.

After the occupation of France in World War II, Joyce moved back to Zurich with his family in 1940.

James Joyce died on January 13, 1941 at the age of 58 in Zurich as a result of a perforated intestine.

What is James Joyce most famous for?

James Joyce is known for his experimental use of language and exploration of new literary methods, including interior monologue, use of a complex network of symbolic parallels, and invented words, puns, and allusions in his novels, especially Ulysses (1922) and Finnegans Wake (1939).

Where was James Joyce from?

Rathgar, is a suburb of Dublin in Ireland. It was originally a village which from 1862 was part of the township of Rathmines and Rathgar; it was absorbed by the growing city and became a suburb in 1930. It lies about three kilometres south of the city centre.

What disease did James Joyce suffer from?

Joyce developed iritis and had frequent episodes with conjunctivitis, glaucoma, episcleritis, synechia and cataracts. Attacks left him writhing on the floor, needing opiates for relief. Various treatments, including cocaine injections and leeches, were tried.

Was James Joyce Catholic or Protestant?

oyce is said to have described the Catholic Church as “here comes everybody.” And while he often pulled himself out of its embrace, his work made frequent forays into Catholic life.

What was James Joyce’s religion?

Born into an Irish Catholic family, Joyce was baptised and confirmed Roman Catholic as a child and educated in Roman Catholic schools until he attended university. Joyce’s decision, as a young man, to leave the Church and the faith of his childhood was an important step in his development as a writer.

What is James Joyce’s most famous book?

Ulysses
1920

Dubliners
1914

Finnegans Wake
1939

The Dead
1914

Araby
1914

Did James Joyce have children?

Lucia Joyce

Giorgio Joyce

How does james joyce compare to shakespeare, dickens?

James Joyce is known for his experimental use of language and exploration of new literary methods, including interior monologue, use of a complex network of symbolic parallels, and invented words, puns, and allusions in his novels, especially Ulysses (1922) and Finnegans Wake (1939).