I personally read Verdaguer as a proud poet, a proud farmer, and pride means faith. It would be interesting to study the fact that at the same time as Verdaguer Tolstoy turned towards a mystical life and thus see the social effect of these two cases. Verdaguer’s work chronicles his life, in the same way that his life chronicles his work. For this reason the prologues to his books are so explanatory. The poet and the flesh - the earth - are one and the same. Verdaguer writes with his body and soul and it is this radicalism which keeps his verses alive, like an organ that regenerates itself. His language is so clean that not even its grammar now seems archaic and what he expresses is equally pure. It is not that Verdaguer was the greatest, but that he is made of different material. In Verdaguer’s time, amongst the dozens of poets writing for the Jocs Florals, were Rubió i Ors - a writer who also requires updating - and Guimerà the poet, whose work is unlikely to cope with being updated. It is possible to write parallel lives for these two founders, as well as parallel legacies. Both were men of great faith, as would be Josep Carner, the only poet who has been able to compare to them. Furthermore, the reference to wings: how many times Verdaguer would ask for them!įor Catalan literature, Verdaguer is as fundamental as was Ramon Llull. It is as if they already knew who stood before them, who he would become. Oh, Verdaguer! You, who from the barren planes and olive trees have come to Barcelona to collect a branch of the tree of glory, return to your nest, bird who flies in a better sky! And, like the swallows each year, pray to God that he lets you spread your wings to come and collect another bouquet or a new leaf ". ![]() "…and upon seeing that he was a youth and a farmer, upon seeing the Catalan barretina -hanging from his arm, he was not just met with applause: a torrent of welcoming cries and claps filled the air, enough to move the high coffered ceiling of the historic Sala de Cent The young poet advanced and Ladies and Gentlemen stopped him along the way, the wise and learned rushed forwards to see him. I see no other explanation for the immediate enthusiasm for these people and the welcome they gave him: ![]() Verdaguer was, at that time, a young boy, completely unknown in Vic a local country poet in attendance to collect a small prize. Taking the Calendari Català, it seems that the enthusiasm of the journalist covering the 1865 Jocs Florals foresaw this incarnation. However, as regards his popularity Verdaguer is, more than anything, a poet of the 19th century, from a time before politics began to discuss in his literature the embodiment of the lost soul literature, as Gaziel claims Catalonia to be. No other Catalan poet has surpassed Verdaguer’s fame, perhaps because Carner and Sagarra were, essentially, poets of the city and Verdaguer is a poet of the city, the country and every home. The centenary also revived Verdaguer’s popularity which, today, finds itself at more or less the same point as before the celebrations.
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