Juan del Encina is often considered the 'father of Castilian theater'. Two periods are usually distinguished in his dramatic creation. The first period is characterized by cultivating a more popular theater, in line with traditional Castilian poetics. In the second period, the author broadens its thematic horizons, while projecting a greater complexity in the use of scenic resources. The very designation of 'eclogue', with which the author refers to his works, links him to a bucolic and pastoral world, in communion with the classical and the Castilian tradition of the 'officium pastorum', representing the adoration of the shepherds to the baby Jesus during Christmas.

Basically, its religious theater is limited to the literature of Christmas and Easter. These liturgical cycles serve as the framework for his first five eclogues in which he portraits the birth, death, and resurrection of Jesus. The author not being merely satisfied with formally showing the religious cycle, he also attempts to bring existential problems to the scene, with shepherds characterized with the looks of the Castilian shepherd of his time.

His influence on Italian theater stands out in his profane theater, of which he got a good acquaintance while spending time in Italy at the papal court of Alexander VI and Julius II. In this kind of theater, the theme of love is treated according to the patterns of songwriting poetry of "pastorales",  with an abundance of "serranas" and "serranillas" (shepherd girls) in the developing scene, allthough a palace is the stage setting, which shows the author's preference for courtly life.

Arte de trobar

Cancionero

Triunfo de la fama

Triste España sin ventura

Églogas

The Cancionero de Palacio is a manuscript compilation of Renaissance pieces of short pieces of popular musical poetry. 

Folklore

Poetry

During the 16th century, the medieval vision of the world enters into crisis. The Renaissance was defined by a substantial and absolute division between Nature and Spirituality. The world of the senses and the world of the spirit was intimately fused in the man of the Middle Ages, to the point that there was one and the same thing. The Renaissance, with its radical individualism, signified a revolutionary change of position that separated the human being from the omniscient spirituality of the Middle Ages. The Renaissance proclaimed that the Middle Age was only a dark period between Antiquity and its time. In this sense, the Renaissance is not a mere cultural period, but a new conception of life that manifests itself in aspects such as politics and science, as well as literature. There is a conscious search for a language full of natural elegance, with a predominance of the novel in different types, chivalry, pastoral, Moorish, and the picaresque among the most popular ones.

During the Renaissance, an enormous effort was made to clearly delimit the world of the individual, separated from the spiritual realm. The independence of the human being was proclaimed on the basis that God and man are two incommunicable entities.  Following Calvin's thought, the creature could not influence the behavior nor the inscrutable decisions of the Creator, the first one predestined from birth.  It was the task of the Spanish theologians at the Council of Trent who fought such a doctrine, proclaiming an intimate connection between God and man. The consequences of Trento were incalculable for the world of culture in Spain, the country exempt from heresy by the council but its cultural future was also determined by it. As the sixteenth century progressed towards its end, the natural and the supernatural world tended to draw closer together for the Spaniards, with the scientific pursuit, and the mere intent of rational thinking viewed with deep suspicion.

Notwithstanding, there is also in Spain an advance in science and discoveries are made, accompanied by a development of urban life and incipient capitalism. The reign of the Catholic Monarchs and later during the  Empire there was a development of humanism, man becoming the center of the universe, with the courtier as the ideal Renaissance man, and a renewed interest in the study of the authors of Antiquity.  The discovery of the printing press in Europe triggered movements of reform, propitiating in Spain a response with the development of particular religious literature known as mysticism. 

Renaissance

Cancionero musical de palacio

Cancionero General, by Hernando del Castillo

Propaplladia, by Bartolomé de Torres Naharro

Retrato de la Lozana andaluza, by Francisco Delicado

Diálogo de la doctrina cristiana, by Jan de Valdés

Relox de príncipes, by Fray Antonio de Guevara

Menosprecio de corte y alabanza de aldea, by Fray Antonio de Guevara

Obras from Boscán and Garcilaso de la Vega

Vida del lazarillo de Tormes (anonimous)

Publication of Indice de libros prohibidos by the Spanish Inquisition

First edition of Diana, by Jorge de Montemayor (Abencerraje include)

First part of Araucana, by Alonso de Ercilla

The  Inquisition jails fray Luis de León for translating The Song of Songs into Spanish

Obras, by Cristobal de Castilejo

La vida es sueño, by Calderón de la Barca

Soledades, by Góngora

Empresas políticas, by Saavedra Fajardo

Civil wars of Granada (first part), by Ginés Pérez de Hita

El Parnaso español, by Quevedo

Las Meninas by Velazquez

Edition of the first French encyclopedia. Diderot's work, although widely criticized, can be considered the first modern encyclopedia.

Samuel Johnson publishes the Dictionary of the English language, with uses, customs and definitions of the words that make up the English language. Includes terms that appear in Shakespeare and other great authors of British literature.

The Tempest, by William Shakespeare

Aminta, by Tasso

The Merchant of Venice, by William Shakespeare

Spanish Bites

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Cancionero de Palacio (1470, compilation vv.aa)

By Juan del Encina

Time Period: Renaissance

Genre: Folklore, Poetry

Spanish Bites

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