Publisher's Synopsis
This study of 16th and 17th-century Spanish literature focuses on the work of Teresa de la Cruz, Cervantes, Aleman, Gracian, Gongora, Lope de Vega and Calderon. The volume has three broad aims: first, to argue the case for standing by literature courses in modern language departments; second, to continue the work of applying to the Golden Age texts the theories and practice of post-structuralism, and third, to re-affirm the historical and cultural importance of a period of Spanish civilization in danger of being eclipsed by obsession with the ultra-modern or the ultra-practical.;In discussing the work of the included writers the contributors raise questions about gender and autobiography, redefinitions of the author's voice as it struggles for authenticity in the criss-cross codes of individual and collective inspiration, deconstruction of narrative contexts, notions of spectatorship and subjectivity, and discourses of power.;The book's main readership is intended to be Hispanist teachers and students of Spanish literature in higher education.
