Quintana was a follower of the Salamancan school.
The cleric Juan Nicasio GALLEGO (1777-1853) rivaled
Quintana as a writer of patriotic verses. A liberal in
politics like Quintana, Gallego also took the page xxxiii
side of his people against the French invaders and against
the servile Spanish rulers. He is best known by the ode
_El dos de mayo_, in which he exults over the rising of
the Spanish against the French on the second of May,
1808; the ode _A la defensa de Buenos Aires_ against the
English; and the elegy _A la muerte de la duquesa de
Frias_ in which he shows that he is capable of deep
feeling. Gallego was a close friend of Quintana, whose
salon in Madrid he frequented. Gallego wrote little, but
his works are more correct in language and style than
those of Quintana. It is interesting that although the
writings of these two poets evince a profound dislike and
distrust of the French, yet both were in their art largely
dominated by the influence of French neo-classicism. This
is but another illustration of the relative conservatism
of belles-lettres.
In the year 1793 there had been formed in Seville by a
group of young writers an Academia de Letras Humanas to
foster the cultivation of letters. The members of this
academy were admirers of Herrera, the Spanish Petrarchist
and patriotic poet of the sixteenth century, and they
strove for a continuation of the tradition of the earlier
Sevillan group. The more important writers of the later
Sevillan school were Arjona, Blanco, Lista and Reinoso.
Manuel Maria de ARJONA (1771-1820), a priest well read in
the Greek and Latin classics, was an imitator of Horace.
Jose Maria BLANCO (1775-1841), known in the history of
English literature as Blanco White, spent much time in
England and wrote in English as well as in Castilian.
Ordained a Catholic priest he later became an Unitarian.
The best-known and most influential writer of the group
was Alberto LISTA (1775-1848), an educator and page xxxiv
later canon of Seville. Lista was a skilful artist and
like Arjona an admirer and imitator of Horace; but his
ideas lacked depth. His best-known poem is probably a
religious one, _A la muerte de Jesus,_ which abounds in
true poetic feeling. Lista exerted great influence as a
teacher and his _Lecciones de literatura espanola_ did
much to stimulate the study of Spanish letters. Felix Jose
REINOSO (1772-1814), also a priest, imitated Milton in
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