Gustavo Adolfo Bécquer was born in 1836 with the last name of Domínguez Bastida, but he chose his Flemish father's second last name of Bécquer, as the family was known around town. His father, José Domínguez Bécquer, who descended from an originally-Flemish family that was well respected in Seville, was a painter of relatively good repute in his native town.
Young Gustavo began his education at San Antonio Abad school, until he was admitted as a student of San Telmo school in 1846, a nautical institution. It was at that school that he met Narciso Campillo, with whom he built a strong friendship. It was also with Campillo that Bécquer began to show his literary vocation, as the two boys started writing while sharing time at San Telmo. A year later, the school was closed by royal order. Gustavo and his siblings were then taken in by their uncle, Don Juan de Vargas, who cared for the children as if they were his own. Shortly after, Gustavo went on to live with his godmother, Doña Manuela Monahay, whose extensive library provided young Bécquer with endless hours of entertainment, which Doña Manuela allowed with pleasure. During this period, Campillo remembers that the poet barely left his godmother’s house, as he spent hours devouring the volumes of her library. Gustavo’s godmother, a well-educated person and also well-to-do, supported his passion for study of the arts and history. However, she wanted Gustavo to have a profession, so in 1850 she got him admitted as a pupil into the studio of Don Antonio Cabral Bejarano, at the Santa Isabel de Hungría school. Gustavo worked at the studio for only two years, when he moved to his uncle Joaquin’s studio and continued developing his skills alongside his brother Valeriano, who was already studying there. Gustavo and Valeriano became from this point very close friends, and they both influenced each other greatly throughout their lives. Luciano, another brother of the poet, also studied with them during this period. Studying the art of drawing did not distract Gustavo from his passion for poetry; furthermore, his uncle Joaquin paid for his Latin classes, which brought him closer to his beloved Horace, one of his earliest influences. Joaquin also noticed the great aptitude of his nephew for words, and encouraged him to pursue writing as a career, contrary to the designs of Doña Manuela, with whom Gustavo was still living at the time.
Orphaned by age 11, Bécquer was strongly influenced by his painter brother, Valeriano. He moved to Madrid in 1854 in pursuit of a literary career, and from 1861 to 1868 he contributed to the newspaper El Contemporáneo and other periodicals. Troubled by an unhappy marriage and financial difficulties, Bécquer received acclaim only after his death from tuberculosis at age 34.
Bécquer’s major literary production consists of nearly 100 Rimas (“Rhymes”), a series of about 20 Leyendas (“Legends”) in prose, and the literary essays Cartas desde mi celda (1864; “Letters from My Cell”). Although many of his poems and prose works were published individually in El Contemporáneo, they did not appear in book form until after his death, when his friends collected his writings and published them in Obras, 2 vol. (1871; “Works”). His Rimas, probably his best-known works, are sensitive, restrained, and deeply subjective.
Bécquer’s poetry explores themes of love—particularly in connection with disillusionment and loneliness—and the mysteries of life and poetry. In sharp contrast to the rhetorical, dramatic style of the Romantic period, Bécquer’s lyricism, in which assonance predominates, is simple and airy.
Bécquer’s prose pieces, Leyendas, are characterized by medieval settings, supernatural characters such as nymphs, and a mysterious, dreamlike atmosphere. Written in a lyrical, richly coloured style, the narratives are based upon the themes of love, death, and the world beyond. His spiritual autobiography, the series of letters Cartas desde mi celda, was composed at the monastery of Veruela, in northern Spain.
(Bécquer publicó la mayoría sus leyendas de forma irregula...)
( El relato El monte de las ánimas es una de las más cono...)
(Este libro ha sido convertido a formato digital por una c...)
(Este libro ha sido convertido a formato digital por una c...)
In 1861, Bécquer met Casta Esteban Navarro, and married her in May 1861. Bécquer was believed to have had a romance with another girl named Elisa Guillén shortly before the marriage, which is also thought to have been arranged, (if not somewhat forced), by the parents of the girl. The poet was not happy in the marriage. Casta and Gustavo had three children.
