Un català a GranadaVíctor Balaguer, mantenidor dels Juegos Florales de 1897

Resumen

In 1897 Víctor Balaguer was invited to Granada to preside over the panel of judges for the Juegos Florales organized by the Real Sociedad de Amigos del País for the Feast of Corpus. Balaguer, poet, in the final years of the century was already a widely known literary figure—aside from his political role—in the restoration of Catalan literature. The organizers sought to secure the success of the awards and to this end enjoyed the support of the press, which played a major role in publicizing in all its detail the visit of the illustrious ‘Troubadour of Montserrat.’ This culminated some months later in the press reporting that the town hall of Granada would assume the expense of publishing a volume featuring the award-winning poems and speeches given, including the one by Balaguer. In this study we examine the contents of the volume, noting the reception of Balaguer’s romantic works written in Catalan and their significant influence on numerous Spanish writers of the period, as seen in the speeches and prize-winning poems. In addition, we see the social, political, economic and cultural transformation occurring in Catalonia, rebelling against the Spanish system’s outright decline, which paradoxically Balaguer came to represent. In end-of-the-century Spain, Catalan modernization drew both admiration and rejection, even among the more progressive circles in Granada, who failed to understand what would come to be called ‘Catalan exclusivism.’