literary movements

Literature

2022

We explain what literary movements are, how they are classified and their main characteristics and examples.

The writers Johann Wolfgang von Goethe and Friedrich Schiller belonged to the Romantic literary movement.

What are literary movements?

Literary movements are the different historical and aesthetic trends that make up the history of the literature. Each literary movement is made up of a group of writers or works that are grouped (or are grouped) because they share a style or certain traits or characteristics. For example, him Surrealism, the Modernism or the magical realism.

There was a great variety of literary movements throughout history and in different regions of the world. Some were more popular, enduring or influential than others and were often accompanied by similar strands in others Arts, as the painting, the music wave philosophy.

Each literary movement is endowed with its own and recognizable meaning, generally in dialogue or in opposition to the literary tradition of the moment, or to the general spirit of his time. Each movement is governed by some principles or foundations shared by its authors, although expressed individually.

Some movements arose from the union of writers who came together to share a common style or objective, but, in many cases, the movements were created a posteriori, as a way for specialists and literary critics to interpret and organize the history of literature, bringing together writers and works that shared common characteristics under the same group.

Characteristics of literary movements

Some literary movements, like Surrealism, were deliberately created.

Some characteristics that literary movements share are:

  • They are used to organize the history of literature. Literature scholars group authors or works that share common features under the name of a movement. However, on many occasions, the movements were formed by groups of writers who expressly set out to create a literary philosophy. For example: The Surrealists were very aware of their existence as an artistic group (not only literary, but also in the plastic arts) and shared a set of techniques of writing that they proposed and used. In some cases, these techniques were novel and inaugurated practices that later continued to be carried out throughout history.
  • They have no strict geographical or temporal limits. Some movements are made up of authors who shared a style or characteristics, but who were not strictly contemporary or did not live in the same region or territory. In many cases, the same author may have, throughout his work, an initial literary trend and then gradually change it to end up inaugurating something new.
  • Many of the literary movements can be appreciated only in hindsight. Unlike other art forms, literature is a particularly slow discipline: books must be written, edited, published, and made known, and then be read, appreciated, and organized into movements. For this reason, many movements were named and recognized long after the works were published, when researchers found common traits in authors.
  • They have a specific purpose and characteristics. The different literary movements are distinguished from each other by their conception of literature, by their purpose or by the specific way in which they use the language. Each movement is characterized by the style or way of carrying out the works, and the authors share objectives or interests.
  • They cover different genres. Literary movements, throughout history, manifested themselves in genres such as poetry, the narrative and the dramaturgy.

Types of literary movements

There is no classification of literary movements because each has its own spirit, context and history. However, it is often spoken of:

  • Classicist movements. They are those movements that proposed the recovery of traditional values ​​of antiquity. This should not be confused, however, with the classicism as an artistic movement (especially important in painting).
  • Avant-garde movements. They are those movements that proposed an express and voluntary break with the literary canons accepted at the time. They emerged at the beginning of the 20th century and aspired to be revolutionary, create something new and innovate.

Literary movements can also be classified according to their inscription in the great intellectual movements of the humanity, such as Renaissance, Baroque, Romanticism, Realism, Classicism, Neoclassicism, among others.

What are the literary movements?

Some of the most popular literary movements are:

  • Renaissance. The renaissance literature was part of an artistic movement that took place during the 15th and 16th centuries, and its main themes were love, mythology and nature. The literature of this period was characterized by anthropocentrism and by the vindication of the values ​​of the classical authors. Some examples of works from this movement are Macbeth, by the English author William Shakespeare; Don Quijote of La Mancha, by the Spanish author Miguel de Cervantes and The Divine Comedy, by the Italian author Dante Alighieri.
  • Baroque. Baroque literature occurred during the seventeenth century and one of the most prominent was the Spanish. Baroque works were characterized by the abundant use of figures and literary resources, and his recurring themes were love, lies, disappointment and death. Some examples of works from this movement are Sourceovejuna, by the Spanish author Lope de Vega; The trickster of Seville, by the Spanish author Tirso de Molina and The life is dream, by the Spanish author Pedro Calderón de la Barca.
  • Neoclassicism. Neoclassical literature occurred during the heyday of this movement in various disciplines during the 18th century. It was a movement that sought to imitate the perfection of the ancient classics of Rome and Greece and was characterized by the predominance of reason and by transmitting values ​​such as order, harmony and beauty. He was critical of other currents such as the Baroque.
  • Romanticism. Romantic literature shared the same philosophical precepts as the other arts that were part of this movement, born during the seventeenth century and which lasted until the nineteenth century. It was a literature that valued above all the sensitivity of the author, especially in poetry, and that moved away from the rational and cosmopolitan world of realism. National imaginaries were preferred (legends, myths, traditions) and the stories in which the interiority of the characters it was the most important thing. Some examples of works from this movement are: The Miserables, the French writer Victor Hugo; the novel The Misadventures of Young Werther, by the German author Johann Wolfgang Goethe and Frankenstein, by the English writer Mery Shelley.
  • Realism. The literature of realism was greatly influenced by the philosophical ideals of the Illustration French and opposed to Romanticism. His conception of literature aspired to an art capable of faithfully representing the reality, so he focused his attention on the narrative, especially on the novel. He used precise, meticulous language, as well as objective and disinterested storytellers for the world of emotions. Some examples of works from this movement are: The novel Madame bovary, by the French author Gustav Flaubert; Crime and Punishment, by the Russian author Fyodor Dostoyevsky and War and peace, by the Russian author Leo Tolstoy.
  • Surrealism. Surrealist literature was characterized by grouping poets and playwrights, rather than storytellers. Like the rest of the artistic movement, which involved painting, the theater and the movie theater, Surrealist writers sought to reproduce in the work the apparent nonsense state of the dream, with its mysterious connections and wild creativity. They valued the craziness, the delirium and the rupture of the forms, for which they were assiduous practitioners of the techniques of the exquisite corpse and of automatic writing. In some cases, they sought to combine poetry with painting or with other experiences, such as performance. One of the most emblematic works of this movement is Surrealism Manifesto, written by the French author André Breton, considered the father of surrealism in this discipline.
  • Modernism. The literature of modernism emerged in the nineteenth century in Latin America, although it was very influential in Spain. So much so, that it was known as "The return of the caravels", since its classicist and baroque way of writing was later imitated in Spain. The modernists aspired to a renewal of the literary language and, for that, they introduced a certain preciousness in their forms and themes, especially in poetry. This movement should not be confused with the philosophical movement of modernity. Some modernist works are: The collection of poems Blue, by Nicaraguan author Rubén Darío and Platero and me, by the Spanish author Juan Ramón Jiménez.
  • Magical realism. The literature of magical realism arose from an artistic movement born in the twentieth century in painting and then introduced to literature. This specific type of realism sought to incorporate the fantastic and wonderful into the stories, without emphasizing their amazing nature, and by telling stories in a realistic and everyday way. The best known exponent of this movement was the Colombian author Gabriel García Márquez, with his novel One hundred years of loneliness.

Importance of literary movements

Literary movements are an essential part of the history of literature and are responsible for enriching it. Throughout history, movements made possible the emergence of new genres of expression and ways of relating to the word, and were related to other artistic expressions that occurred at the same time. They were movements that were fed back because they arose as inspiration or as a rejection of other movements.

Literary movements are important because they expand the forms and uses that can be given to the word. They allow, at present, to make use of the themes and the resources raised and to continue expanding the scope of these movements, which are not something static but serve as inspiration for new texts and are influences for writers and movements of today.

Throughout history, different literary movements emerged that accompanied the political and social changes of each era. This allows that, through the works, it is possible to know about the environment and historical moment in which they were written. According to the topics addressed by each movement and the use of language and resources, literary movements leave evidence on changes and historical and cultural milestones and the way of seeing the world of the human being in each period.

!-- GDPR -->