Writers working under wretched conditions : Luis Cernuda and the Spanish canon

Abstract

Although Luis Cernuda’s views on Spanish literature have already been the object of study, the aim of this article is to throw new light on them or, to be precise, on the canonizing operations that Cernuda performs in, and through, some of his poems and critical studies. The article will focus on the friction identified by Cernuda between the Spanish poets whose canonicity he advocates, on the one hand, and, on the other, the society in which these poets lived and worked. It will be argued that such friction can be interpreted through the lens provided by the concept of ‘genius’ as defined by Arthur Schopenhauer in The World as Will and Representation.