Ana T. Villar-Prados
Tinker Report
September 19th, 2009
Tinker Summer Field Research Report
The main objective of this report is to inform the outcome(s) of the summer field research
made in Spain during the Summer of 2009 made possible by the Tinker Grant that was awarded to
me. The outcome and product of this research did not only surpass all my expectations but,
simultaneously, solidified the topic and subject of my dissertation as a first year PhD student.
Before embarking to the Iberian Peninsula on the month of July 2009, my main purpose was to
take a deeper look at key factors that influenced the literary representations of geographical and
urban space in Luis de Góngora´s poetic production during early modern Spain. Like I had
mentioned before, although Luis de Góngora is one of the most important literary figures in
Spain´s history- and the creator of what is now known as “culteranismo”- very little attention has
been given to his distinctive representations of geographical and urban sceneries in his poetic
production. After taking a closer look at the geographical and urban representations in Góngora´s
poetic production- which are found mainly in his ballads (romances) and burlesque poems- I have
come to the following conclusion: that there is indeed an implicit and explicit rivalry between
Andalusian and Castilian poets literally and figuratively expressed in Góngora´s geographical
poems. I was also surprised to find out that this rivalry was not only expressed throughout literary
expressions but, nonetheless, through official documents authorized by the Spanish Crown-known
as “crónicas” and “realciones”- and in the chorographic production of the time (maps).
Like I had mentioned before, I have always been particularly interested in the ways that this
rivalry is represented through the construction and representation of poetical sceneries found in
Góngora´s poems. In many of his poems- especially those dedicated to the cities of Seville,
Villar-Prados 2
Granada, and Córdoba- Luis de Góngora idealizes and hyperbolizes the natural geographical
beauty and the traditional and historical architectural charm of southern Spain. On the other hand,
when it comes to poems dedicated to the Spanish Court in Madrid and Valladolid, Góngora
condemns these cities for their horrendous appearance, hypocritical and superficial inhabitants,
and their “shallow” and dirty geographical surroundings. For instance, one of Góngora´s most
commonly used images which reveals this “rivalry”, between Castile and Andalusia, is the
supremacy of the Andalusian Guadalquivir River over the Tajo and Esgueva Rivers of Castile.
Andalusia is, therefore, conceptualized as a bucolic paradise, whereas, Castile is represented as a
degrading and punitive region. After my experience in Spain, I realized that the city of Toledo had
to be added in my research: it was one of the most important cities in early modern Spain and it
also happens to be one of the most represented cities in literary texts and drawings of the time.
To my surprise, I also found out that this “supremacy” of the Andalusian rivers was not
only characteristically of Góngora, but of many “cronistas” (whether Spanish or from the rest of
Europe) as well. For instance, I was able to prove- as Richard Kagan has already mentioned in his
renowned research- that the chorographic literature of the time purposely constructed visual
representations that directly and indirectly emphasized certain aspects of a city that the map´s
creator wished to highlight. In the case of Antonio de las Viñas (a Flemish painter that in 1561
travelled throughout Spain drawing and illustrating city views and sceneries by command of Phillip
II), his work makes special emphasis in the city´s avant garde architecture, the bodies of water that
may be near it and last, but not least, people interacting in their daily lives. The fact that a painter
like Antonio de las Viñas included these three concepts in all of his drawings- architecture, water,
and people- should not be taken vainly. These are, in fact, all symbols of greatness in early modern
Europe. In the case of early modern Spain, these symbols were even more significant because they
“proved” to the rest of Europe that they were now an Imperial force within the continent: they
Villar-Prados 3
could now be compared with the great cities and civilizations of the world. The representation of
people interacting in their daily life was a metaphor of an increase of population, of merchants,
and of revenues that were now inherent parts of the main Spanish cities. Of course, like the poems
from Góngora, this hyperbolization of the geographical and city views also had political
connotations. Luis de Góngora, on the other hand, takes these symbols and makes them
distinctively Andalusian and, therefore, emphasizing southern supremacy over Castile.
I was able to come to all of these conclusions after many hours and days spent at the
Biblioteca Nacional in Madrid. There I had access to authentic city and geographical maps of
sixteenth and seventeenth century Spain in the world renowned Sala Goya. Having access to this
type of material (maps, chorographic literature, and architectural designs), allowed me to take a
glance at other representations of Castile and Andalusia geographically and structurally speaking
and, therefore, reveal the degree of verisimilitude that exists in the literary representation found in
Góngora´s poems. I also had the opportunity to work directly with primary literary sources such
as “crónicas”, “relaciones”, and “anales municipales” in the Sala Cervantes at the Biblioteca
Nacional in Madrid and in the “Archivo Municipal” of Seville. As a result, I have been able to not
only have notes and photocopies of original documents but to also expand my bibliography
regarding this subject. I am also very glad to have had the opportunity to work directly with two of
the most important works of literature regarding the cities of Spain in the Sixteenth Century: the
“Relaciones topográficas de Felipe II” (literally “topographical accounts/reports” during the reign
of Phillip II) in the Biblioteca Nacional in Madrid and, in Seville I was able to study a chronicle,
written in 1582 by José Alonso Morgado, called “Historia de Sevilla en la qual se contienen sus
antiguedades, grandezas y cosas memorables en ella contecidas desde su fundación hasta nuestros
tiempos”. Alonso Morgado´s chronicle- which intends to reflect Seville´s historical greatness and
multiple virtues from its foundation until the sixteenth century- and the “Relaciones topográficas
Villar-Prados 4
de Felipe II” are two of the many primary sources that I had access to and, as a result, was able
compare them to Góngora´s urban and geographical representations in his poetry.
Having had access to primary sources of urban literature, pictorial representations, and
chorographic literature in Madrid and Seville, undoubtedly, helped me understand to a better
degree how the poetic representation(s) of natural and geographical sceneries in Góngora´s poems
serve as metaphors of the tumultuous and unstable social context of the Spanish Golden Age.
Therefore, it should not be surprising to us that the “rivalry” between Castile and Andalusia
implicitly and explicitly intertwined in many of Góngora´s poems reveal, indeed, a social and
historical context submerged in crisis. I am very proud to say that the multiple outcomes of this
summer research opportunity will be presented in two important literary conferences during Fall of
2009. One of these conferences being Views and Visions hosted by the graduate students from the
Spanish and Portuguese Department of Tulane University (held at Tulane, October 9-10, 2009)
and the other conference being the prestigious Ninth Biennial Conference of the Society for
Renaissance and Baroque Hispanic Poetry (held at the University of Oregon, November 5-6,
2009).