This analysis critiques Francisco de Quevedo's sonnet "To a friend who retired from court and passed his age," arguing that the poem's exaltation of a retired, simple life (the beatus ille theme) is a form of idealism rooted in philosophical sophistry and personal cynicism, rather than genuine lived experience.
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In this session we are going to deal with a very important issue that has to do with
Quevedo's sonnet. The Quevedo sonnet to which we are referring is titled to a friend who retired from the court and passed
his age. What does this Quevedo sonnet give us in the first place? It must be taken into account that Quevedo
is an author who was born in 1580 and died in 1645, the same year in which
the Count Duke of Olivares died. This is a sonnet in the one in which the theme of the beatus ile is developed What
does this mean the theme of a person who is very happy as he is is developed is an
exaltation of the state of mind characteristic of a certain way of conceiving life
that frequently that frequently And At least this is what happens in the case of Guevedo. It is a way of
conceiving life removed from tumultuous environments, environments related to the court, with the
intrigues of the court, with the intrigues of the world itself of the city, that is to say, here what is done.
It is an exaltation of the retired life, but this exaltation of the retired life already contains certain
contradictions. It is a clear exalted retreat. The exalted retreat can already lead us along some
paths towards mysticism and along other paths towards certain forms of idealism. Here we are going
to analyze this Quevedo's sonnet showing that he incurs in idealism and
you may ask yourself how it is possible that Quevedo incurs in idealisms that the author
of disillusionment cannot see. How idealisms that an author sees may incur of the Spanish Golden Age How
idealisms are incurred Well, yes, Quevedo also incurs idealisms because when Quevedo uses, above
all, philosophy and Senequier philosophy as support in the development of certain
literary themes that he travels along the paths of idealism and this inevitably occurs because
all Philosophy always leads to idealism, some of them already openly circulate
through idealism, but there is no philosophy, no matter how Materialist it may be, that is not oriented towards idealism,
all philosophies always end up postulating idealisms and leading towards
idealism all those who pass through it and the same thing happens to Quevedo,
especially when he uses the philosophical senequier in this sonnet that quebedo is going to exalt the figure of the
blessed one of the beatus ile blessed one happy one who can living outside the court
outside of political intrigue outside of all kinds of negotiations intrigues approaches gossip
pretentious political objectives that make him mortgage his life in the name of certain
ideals with frequency related to success power what today we would call leadership entrepreneurship
etcetera etcetera that is to say it is a praise to a life completely withdrawn to
a life totally separated from pretensions of ambitions of objectives etcetera etcetera
this is total idealism and I warn you that it is a complete idealism often when
writers and philosophers dedicate themselves to contemplating this exaltation of a retired life they do so
because they have failed in other aspects but not because it is really comfortable for them it is very
nice to lead a retired life When one has income, one lives on a good pension or has simply
worked and then retired, a kind of ivory tower. As Monte did, for example, when
he wrote his essays after having sent a lot of well-preached people to the Bordeaux gallows.
In short, who He lives well, as was the case with Seneca until Nero discovered the
embezzlement he committed and forced him to pay for it, but in the meantime one continues to pretend a
very virtuous life. Of course, the virtues that someone who leads a
retired life and one wonders what these virtues consist of, that is to say, what are the virtues of
someone who doesn't really do anything, not because the retired life as described by many philosophers
or many writers is actually not a retired life at all, it is a retired life. impossible Is it really
an impossible life or is it the life of a drone In short, because there is no use
or benefit, nor is it possible to say that there is any effective content in a
retired life, that is, in short, there is nothing, it is an empty set It is an absolute idealism and here
we are going to see it exactly and we are going to criticize what I see in this approach, I insist
The poem is titled to a friend who retired from court spent his age here age means life
spent his life spent his age Age is synonymous with life it is a synecdoche it is a part of life
that indicates the whole the totality of life The friend It is a fictitious figure, it is a fictitious character
to whom Quevedo directs his statement, his poem, his sonnet and ultimately attributes to him a
series of qualities by virtue of which he expresses a series of virtues that here we are going
to discuss as such virtues as prototypical archetypal ones. characteristics of what an
exemplary retired life is, I personally question whether one can speak of
virtue when talking about a retired life, but these are the ideals of a
senquiu philosophy,
there are many antecedents that raise this type of theme, this type In figure
the exaltation of the retired life in the format in the character of the blessed one who is capable
of living emancipated from ambitions, emancipated from the luxurious political objectives of money, the
power of the glory of vain Glory In short, but of course, if we we take this literally
verbatim Well, we will end up going into the storage room at home and leading a
completely retired life, but of course living buried in the storage room at home leading a retired life
does not allow us to exercise the narcissism of saying that I lead a retired life, of course leading a
retired life. It implies, above all, disappearing from the Internet, disappearing from public spaces and not exhibiting
the virtues of a supposedly retired life, of course, which is already very unprofitable because the merit
of a retired life consists of exhibiting it and having others praise you, but of course if you exhibit a
retired life eh, making it public really seems very suspicious, that is not to say, it is like someone
who gives a lot of money to someone who needs it to take a photo with the needy, that
is. In short, advertising that is not hidden but clearly revealed is called cynicism, cynicism
that travels publicly with safe conduct. of a politically correct solidarity well
here Something very similar happens with the retired life In short, I insist, we are going
to read this sonnet, we are going to examine this sonnet But first we must warn that among the
very clear precedents of of of of this sonnet that are not born, they do not appear immediately in
Quevedo's lyrics, because we must keep in mind that we think, for example, of all of
Virgil's literature in the Georgias. Virgil already exalts the wealth of farmers. And in this sense
he warns about everything. of the importance for someone who lives in the countryside and in
contact with nature, the well-being that this entails. We agree with this completely,
that is, spending a Sunday afternoon in the countryside or a Saturday or a Monday or a Friday afternoon. could be
very interesting but dedicating yourself to agriculture and caring for livestock is something completely
different. In other words, practicing the shepherding that the shepherd Marcela does as a kind of
female exhibitor admired by a lot of men and shepherds is very nice, especially when you have
a lot of money. and one trusts in herding as a kind of preservative placenta with respect to
male harassment. Poor thing, I am so pretty and everyone is chasing me, not like that popular
song that said El Chulo is chasing me. Well, here the shepherd is chasing me and the shepherdess Marcela
exhibits her beauty and her narcissism as a woman persecuted by other shepherds who do not stop
lovingly pretending to be true while she is a false shepherdess, but another matter is dedicating herself to
taking care of the real cattle because of course the pastoral novel is not the same as the social novel.
then of course When we exalt nature and place the image of the beatus sile in
the virtuous person who takes care of cattle it is because we have probably never taken care of cattle. Of course
because the beatus sile of being milking cows permanently before
automatic cow milkers became available has very little to do with the beatus sile,
that is, in the georgi Virgil praises the life of the farmer because Virgil has never tilled
the land if he had to till it instead of having written Las georgias I would write a
social novel but it is not like that the same thing happens with Horacio and his odes the same thing happens with the eclogues
by Garcilaso and the same thing happens Well with poems by Lupercio eh Leonardo by Argensola in short
and well with poems by Góngora who also praises the retired life Yes but praises the retired life
when one has a pension to maintain it but obviously in the case of Seneca, for
example, in Hercules Furens, praises precisely the people who dedicate themselves to the contemplation of
streams and grass, of course, one can spend one's life listening to the grass grow, as that one said.
another poet but to do that You have to have money and you have to have coverage Then
go aus sile he who is rich and dedicates himself to pleasing the grass or watching the clouds go by
but the farmer cannot entertain himself in that Someone who has been farmer cannot
say that he is a beatus ile because field work is one of the hardest there is, that is to say that
it is as if we said that beatus is the sailor or the miner who contemplates the sea or who bites coal
under the earth, not like the popular song of the mine and the sea, the Popular Asturian song, but
none of that has to do with reality, that is, literature and philosophy have idealized many
vital behaviors, feeling special nostalgia for them and recreating themselves philosophically
or literary and in this way trying to dignify the poet who brings these themes to his
literature or the philosopher who evokes them, as in the case of Seneca, Seneca never worked the land
and yet he dedicates himself to identifying with those farmers who Seneca supposes have a
life of a great quality Because they live removed from the court and Seneca says so that he spent his entire
life licking Nero's ass In short, it is a very curious thing, Quevedo says that
he spent his entire life exercising intrigues at court against the Duke of Olivares and against anyone who
presents himself as an adversary of his own ideas, that is, all these people who spent their
lives exercising intrigues always have moments in their own lives in which they declare themselves nostalgic and
wishing to lead a retired life. Well, if you have a retired life Get into a religious order
Get into a dungeon in a cell and lead the retired life you want there but don't say one
thing and do the opposite In short, no That is how Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz joins an
order religious like the shepherdess Marcela enters a royal order to avoid, let's say, interacting
with men because they don't like them Marcela doesn't even like the nuns Marcela prefers goats
to men and nuns she runs away from the convent so much Monjil, as he prefers civil society and
marriage, prefers a relationship with goats. I find it as interesting as any other
literary motif. In the case of Guevedo, he spent his entire life scheming at court and from time to
time he gets off the hook quite frequently. By the way. with a series of poems where he condemns the
courtly life and the Ho to the village life and also invokes Ceca who is another cynic also of the
virtues of the exercise of virtues saying no no no no I also prefer the courtly life
I prefer to live hearing the grass grow Yes, but those thirds that you stole from him Where are the ubis
sunt those moneys in short and not to mention the one in the ode to the retired life of Fray Luis
De León and in short and so many other poems by de Boscá like the epistle eraso de argensola oo in short
eh so many others or the epistle of Diego Gustavo de Mendoza of the own look for let's see specifically
this one sonnet We are going to read this sonnet by Quevedo first initially and then
we will analyze a series of its parts and characteristics, but as I said, when writers and
philosophers praise the retired life, they do it as a personal therapy because they have probably had
problems with the courtly life and I insist that they try to sublimate the loses by imagining leading
a retired life that they have always been incapable of leading, that is, these people have died with their
boots on, even retired in the peace of these deserts retired in the peace of these deserts
was when they no longer He could handle the troubles of his life and after having been imprisoned in the
San Marcos prison in León by the Count, Duke of Olivares, and he was practically going to die there,
as soon as he said this sonnet to a friend This sonnet that everyone
The world knows it by heart, except for me who doesn't know it by heart. A friend who retired from court
spent his age, that is to say, he spent his life just as it is in the title, back here says the happy sonnet, you
who are happy in your cabin, young man and old man you breathed the pure aura and they serve as a cradle and grave of
straw the roof the belfry floor in that solitude that free quietly bathes the sun with a safer light
life the day lasts more space and the voiceless hour disappoints you you do not count for the consul the years
ago in your calendar your crops you step on your entire world without deception of everything you ignore you
take advantage of or crave prizes or suffer damage and you dilate The more you tighten up well this
sonnet sounds very good it is a perfect sonnet it is an unsurpassable auricular sonnet It really
is one of the works of literary goldsmithing of poetic goldsmithing carved by a Quevedo who knows how
to sculpt philologically literary poetically sonnetist one that there is not the slightest doubt is a
totally evocative sonnet blessed you blessed you beatus sile that is to say glorious happy you be that
Joyful in your cabin the cabin the hut in front of the palaces that is to say the rural architecture in front
of the courtly architecture in front of the palace of the King in front of the palace of the Duke of noble
is happy in his hut well the social novel will change all these approaches in dostoyevsky
no one will be happy in his cane obviously this is an image typical of a more
classical more traditional literature but reality was not usually like that the people who lived in the cabins
did not live exactly happy Happy in your cabin young and old you expired the pure aura young and old
that is to say throughout your life from young to your old age until your death that is to say your entire life the
age Ultimately the step of age life All you breathed out the pure aura that is to say you breathed aura no
pure aura does not appeal here in that semi-cadence or internal rhyme aura ura ura ura pure aura does not refer the
aura to the adjective golden as the case by auristela Estrella de Oro the protagonist of the persiles of
singular and extreme beauty you expired Laura pure refers you breathed a
pure gentle wind a gentle and pure wind aura is a soft wind it is not the cierzo it is not the wind from the North
but it is a soft wind the pure aura is a soft and clean wind a clean air a pure Air
you did not breathe in the sense of saying that from your birth to your death you lived in a
clean, unpolluted environment In short, that is to say, it is literature today today that the gringos
have invented a galloping nonsense called ecocriticism that serves no purpose other than to make fun
of it, obviously of course the gringos who don't even know this poem talk about ecocriticism
not young and old you expired Laura pure Laura pure not Laura the woman sung by Petrarca but
the aura we make a pure sinalefa and they serve as your cradle and grave. Notice that
this rhyme hura hura is reiterated again and they serve as your cradle and grave of straw. ceiling the floor of belfry
That is to say again that intertextual reference to the work of Quevedo of the cradle the grave before
we have seen young and old now cradle and grave that is to say semantically there is a reiteration of these
meanings that cover the complete life trajectory from the birth to death It seems that
this person lives in innocence later with Rousseau we will talk not about the virtuous man who
lives away from the court but about the noble savage which is another mythological way of repeating the same theme
but in an illustrated version That is to say, in a much more impoverished but monstrously
idealistic version, and I emphasize how monstrously idealistic, the figure of the noble savage is a
galloping idealist myth, that is to say, considering that the Enlightenment was rational is not knowing what
the Enlightenment is or what reason is. but well, that's what we're in, eh, that's what we're in, and
the straw roof and floor of the belfry, that is to say, the belfry, as everyone
knows, is an architectural arrangement that frequently culminates in a building. pointed in shape
, in the shape of a cattail or bayonet, that is, triangular in shape where there is usually a hole
to place some bells. In fact, the belfry is sometimes synonymous with a bell tower. It is that
triangular arrangement that that frieze has or that that triangular planking. What is the finishing of a façade?
eh, without further ado, eh coverage that itself, that is, it is like a trellis, eh, with the hole for the
bells, that is a belfry, that is, the highest area of a building that sometimes has a
triangular layout. Well, that serves as the floor and ultimately the roof. It is made of straw, that is to say, there is an oxymoron and
a truly contradictory relationship between straw, the roof and the floor of belfry, that is to say, it
can live completely uncovered. But it lives very well and the roof is made of straw because obviously, as the
floor can also be made of straw, it is a roofing That is to say, it is a totally
humble construction in In short, almost like the birds whose ground the cattails In short, because they have
their nests at the top of the cattails, that is, it constantly refers to a
completely humble construction, not what gives happiness, we would say that the Poverty gives happiness, this is
a completely different idea than the one that tends to say that money gives happiness or does not give
happiness, it is a stupid question that people ask, no, and others respond more foolishly, no, the ready-made purchase,
money does not give happiness, purchase already made well each one think what comes out of
your nose the truth is that here there is an exaltation of misery that is to say here we would say
poverty gives happiness don't look at poverty does not give happiness another thing is that you settle
for what you have clo that It can be the motto of certain societies that plunge people into
extreme poverty and it tells them happily and clearly that with this type of poems
there are political regimes that solve all the concerns of society as much as you the less
you have the happier It will be clear, imagine that there is a Ministry of Development or a
Ministry of Health or a Ministry of Housing that is governed by these criteria, that is, when
the living conditions are more miserable for you, the greater your happiness will be in this society
in which that everyone lives obsessed with happiness, imagine injecting yourself with an
overdose of material misery and poverty so that the greater the misery in which
people live, the greater their happiness. The current world is going in an absolutely opposite direction.
happiness through money but we are always going to find self-help messages where
some kind of parables frequently appear, a kind of stories or short stories where they say
Well, this person is very humble because Eh Well, I don't know, hey, he takes the food instead of on a
plate well eh in an empty barber's not to say another filthy no And then Well well
Hey well that's great because Look you eat in a sleeper no or in a doril eh well but that's not
It is not something that reproduces either the quality of life or happiness or anything like that at
all. They don't say well, such a person has a lot of money and yet he is very Modest because he uses
an old mobile phone Well that's like saying Well then cynicism by Marie Antoinette, no, well
, no, since he doesn't have money to eat bread, he eats cookies, well, you guys go and make fun of me
somewhere else, and the one I see with this sonnet, too, man, don't make fun of me, no,
may Mr. Quevedo rest in peace. but what Don't expect me to believe that this beatus chile viv
la miseria, then in the second Quartet, Quevedo warns of that loneliness that free
bathes loneliness does not refer so much to a solitary life as to a solitary place as
to a hermitage, that is, a place where He lives only, of course, in Soledad, a hermit.
But he lives basically apart, he leads a solitary life, spatially solitary, spatially
secluded, because his solitude, as Saint John of the Cross would say, is a Sonoran solitude, not in that solitude
in that secluded place in that en that secluded toponymy that free quietly bathes the sun with a
safer light quiet sun is good is a hipal is a is a condensation of rhetorical figures
because it is not that the sun is quiet quiet is the way of life spoke before San Juan
de la Cruz mentioned a loneliness Sonora the quiet music the solitude Sonora the one that recreates
and falls in love Quevedo speaks of a place apart from a solitude that free free of course
freedom is associated with loneliness is a harmful association On a desert island there is no more freedom that in a
city on a desert island you have freedom for everything because the maximum freedom implies
zero activity when everything is nothing nothing is everything on a desert island you can do everything because
you can't do anything In short in such a way that in this solitude that free bathes a quiet sun
a quiet sun with a safer light that is to say that the sun of the rural world is a
less conflictive sun than the splendor of the court that the light of the court that the blinding light of power
is what comes to say here it is to say that the light of poverty The Sun of poverty is a sun
less blinding less deceptive less fraudulent than the splendor of the court than the wonder
of the court that deceives the senses and enters through the eyes and destroys human life by becoming
luminous in The rich is a very deceptive life that in many cases leads to failure, we are going to see
neither black nor white, that is, neither Mondays in the sun nor the deceptions of a
totally false life. Here we go to extremes, too radical,
too radical, nor the Absolute poverty guarantees Happiness, nor does extreme money
guarantee happiness. The thing is, human success cannot be subordinated
to either extreme poverty or extreme wealth. These are idealizations given in extremism
that, although communicated in literature, are not compatible with human rationalism.
In a Materialist rationalism, daily life lasts more space, that is, daily life, that is, the
luminous life that this sun gives has more space in a space in a sense of temporal volume,
that is, it is worth more, it occupies more, it dilates, it lasts longer. in the time that the other well
This is we would say clearly an opinion This is an opinion of Quevedo consider that the life
of the poor is richer it is more enriching than the life of the rich Why Well because the values of
the wealth of the poor are elsewhere they are in what part because they are in an idea of virtue
in an idea of overcoming passions Well that is very debatable because since when is the rich
not virtuous also if he wants Since when can the rich not overcome certain passions is
the poor are more virtuous than the rich because be poor. It's a completely
free idea that It's like saying, well, we're poor, but we're honest, well, but
there are also rich people who are honest, even if it doesn't seem like it. And there are poor people
who don't have anything honest because they are the most miserable thing there can be, that is to say, this
self-attention to an original sin is totally free. That's like saying well, because I'm from
Gijon, I'm virtuous and one thing has to do with another, or saying well,
because I'm a professor of literary theory, to say the least, I'm worth more
than someone who isn't. and and what does it have to see one thing with another you are worth more for what To
be stupid I want to say that that is nonsense like the top of a pine tree that is to say self
attribution is to say or me for being tall blonde and having blue or green eyes or whatever Well,
I am worth more than someone who is otherwise. That is completely ridiculous. That is to say as ridiculous
as saying that the poor or those who lead a poor life are more virtuous than those who
lead a rich life. That is a literary motif widely exploited by philosophy asequemetratra
is what you have no choice but to assume when you have no other alternatives in life,
that is to say that no one has a vocation to be poor, that is, another question is that one has to
make oneself compatible with misery or poverty because there are no others. alternatives in life but
obviously consider that the hour without a voice disappoints you because poverty disillusions you. The passage
of time without voiceless siren songs, that is, without seductive voices that induce you to failure,
will provide you with disappointment. That is not the case either because life in
the court provides you with greater disappointment than a life separated from civilization where what is not known is the relationship with the
evil one. To put it clearly, rural life, country life does not preserve your innocence but
rather develops other forms of malice that are exempt from the court that is used in The criteria when
examining malice of the court but the plural life is not in itself
an innocent life like being a savage No It is in itself an innocence that later Rousseau will proclaim
in the Enlightenment That is to say, in fact, the myth of the noble savage It is nothing more than a continuation, an
illustrated concept of the myth of the beatus sile of the one who leads a retired life In short, it is not that
he is not in contact with civilization because the topic of The contempt of court and praise of the
village is nothing more than a precedent of the contempt of civilization and praise of barbarism, which
is what Rousseau is going to propose with the myth of the noble savage. In short, what the Enlightenment
does is to propose myths that replace the previous myths And that in this case
the praise of a life of barbarism compared to a civilized life still prevails today when Rousseau
spent his entire life in courtly and civilized environments in the same way that he
spent his entire life condemning the Writing and writing books is a very curious thing,
not in the same way that Foucault spent his entire life condemning Power and serving power,
but clearly serving power, come on. How many books did he publish? Foucault printed them in the
Amazon jungle, he didn't print them in Paris, of course. How curious, not this, or in the United States, of course, the
final two tercets, the last two tercets refer above all to an absolutely natural and
current concept of time, the measurement of time is given by nature, no. civilization you do not count by the
consuls your years you do not count by the consuls the years that is to say it is known by everyone that in
Rome from the Republic until the last years of the empire the years were counted taking as
reference the consulates consular appointments So let's say that the calculation
of time has nothing to do with civilization or with a political concept
of the organization of life but with an absolutely natural rhythm with an absolutely
natural ritual dawn, dusk and the cycle of the seasons, make your harvests in your calendar,
that is, the rhythm of the earth, your harvests, but of course I'm going to ask Quevedo And how many
harvests Don Francisco have you made throughout your life, he's like Plato when he says Well, no one
comes in here. who does not know geometry Well, what geometry have you practiced plowing, cultivating
the land Plato of the HM very clearly it is very easy to talk about these matters but in
reality the praise of agriculture is never done by a farmer it is done by someone who idealizes life
of the farmer like the praise of animals is not done by someone who deals with real animals
but by someone who idealizes the relationship with the animal rather than a veterinarian you step on your entire
world without deception well you step on your entire world without deception because it You say because you attribute, in
an idealized self-attribution, a world without deceptions, the rural world is as deceptive as
the world of cities, what happens is that their deceptions occur on a completely
different scale, eh, they occur at a completely different level of deception. deception that is completely different
from that of the cities but is not exempt from deceptions is not exempt from appearances nor does
the first appearance consist in the idealization of agriculture in the idealization of the care
of livestock the idealization of crops and in the idealization of one survival with its back
to civilization and of course the last of the tercets is literary constructed
with great quality but it is a monument to the idealism of everything that you ignore you take advantage of.
Of course, notice that modernity is going to say the opposite, conscience will say modernity and
postmodernity consciousness is a pain knowledge increases a pain knowledge
increases human intellectual torture The more you ignore the less you know about reality
the happier you live well if this were the case no cancer would be cured of course this is the denial
of science this is the denial of science In the name of philosophical idealism in the name of the
literary virtue of leading a retired life of course this is In short one of the forms of
nostalgia for the barbarism of everything that you ignore you take advantage of it they do not ignore it no
This is the myth of the noble savage in golden age format that bedco of Roots and genealogy senquiu who
imagines himself virtuous in any case can be considered that this person who himself
imagines virtuous is a cynic is a cynic before himself and before others because no one is exempt from
suffering damage due to a very retired life that he leads because the retired life does not guarantee that you will not suffer
damage one can be at home and can be sure of If he lives, well, let's imagine that in
a small town in La Mancha he's not going to be run over by an ocean liner because the
ocean liner probably isn't going to reach the little town in La Mancha, but for him to lead a retired life, that's not true.
It means that it does not have an incident and that it does not suffer damage. Another issue is that it
refers to court damages, to damages of ambitions or projects, of course, nor do
you yearn for prizes, of course. Imagine that a National evaluation agency, for example Aneca, presented in its
web page a sonnet like this to all those who would like to accredit contracted doctors,
university professors or university professors and tell them do not long for awards and you will not
suffer damage, of course this could be the motto of one of the national agencies of evaluation, that is to
say, Don't be pretentious as a certain individual once told me, he says that you want to
be an icarus, this boy says that he wants to be an icarus, they told me when when I wanted to make
a resume and prosper, it is not saying that he wants to be an icarus and people told me that perhaps he had
obtained the professorship at 28 years old. eh, the subject has flats, not everything that you ignore, you take advantage of,
nor do you yearn for awards nor do you suffer damage, so I insist Imagine that a curriculum evaluation agency
tells someone not to crave awards. No, you won't suffer harm, of course, many people told me
when hey, we were young and and we were young decades ago and and one tried to develop
curricularly, they said that you are too young, that you are very young and it was said by people who perhaps
at the age of 28 had obtained the professorship, imagine who can obtain a
professorship from the university today at the age of 28, well 30 years ago some could do it recently more than 30
years old some could do it and when the face is over they told the others you are too young
they said you are too young that is to say no don't have pretensions and they gave lessons in virtuosity in
the sense of stay there Shut your mouth don't bray And obey, that was the approach,
not basically what there was. Then it was very funny because the topic of youth was always
a reproach, that is, you are very young, you have to wait and you go to a doctoral thesis and you
I said it's that you, no, you don't have experience, they treated you as you, I said, and you had to treat them
as you. It was a curious thing. Today it happens the other way around. That is to say, for me, 30 years ago the students
used to treat me as you and I treated them as you. Today I treat them of you and they treat me of you, that is,
look at the panorama of the world upside down, no. In short, then, imagine, I insist on this, a
National evaluation agency that would put on its website neither yearning for awards nor not longing for
awards and No You will suffer damage, of course, it is a wonderful thing, then with these ideals that
bedez things, where are we going, well, to the suppression of all progress and all prosperity and
they will tell you and if you do not crave rewards, you will not suffer damage and it will also delay you How much The more you narrow,
that is, the more you humble yourself, the more you will grow, the more recognition you will have. Hey, look, don't
kid me with this, that is, and you dilate. The more you narrow, that is, you will grow
more when you lead a more modest life. When HM, the greater the hardship in which you live, the
greater the growth. We assume that I do not know about your virtues or your wonders, but of course we make
people believe that the more misery they have in their lives, the less ambition that
characterizes them. It's going to be better and you're going to live better. That's a story that anyone who preaches it can believe
. I don't. Even if he tells me that I see it, even if he tells me that I see it, he's going to believe it, but I
don't believe it. I think another thing is that Quevedo needs to write this type of things therapeutically to
recover in health from some of the ambitions that he has executed but that is a question of Quevedo
and his beloved Seneca who can put it where he wants but I don't. I do not want this
praise of the retired life at all and that is what we are going to do in the final interpretation of the poem, this praise of
the retired life that contains the exaltation of viato sile of blessed this type of person
I do not know where the happiness of this type of person will be but If you literally follow these
approaches, renounce all types of professional promotion renounce all types of requests for
accreditations I don't know all these people who are accredited in the neca it seems that they have not read this
poem by Quevedo or that reading it they do not agree with it that I would obviously do the same but notice
that it has two tendencies for one On the other hand, the rejection of the city, that is, the rejection of the city of
urban life, of the civilized life of the kitas of the polis, which above all implies the rejection
of the luxury of money and the Power of the luxury of the comfort of the quality of life. about money and
power, I won't tell you anything if we eliminate first class on Renfe or business class on airplanes,
it's not saying no, you don't travel in fifth class, don't travel with animals, travel with beasts, travel with
cows or with all this type of things go on a trip in the wagon cattle, how we traveled in third class
in the 19th century, today we travel with animals in first class, eh, be careful, eh, let's look
at where we have evolved with all these types of issues, of course, you don't travel with cows in
business class in the planes but everything will come you take it easy take it easy take it
easy little by little the rejection of the luxury of money and power is the fundamental motto and the
praise of village life The praise of the village the praise of rural and country life is a praise
on the one hand spiritual and on the other hand also material but in both cases of a
galloping idealism it is spiritual insofar as it praises the I don't know the virtues of the spirit that I don't know which ones
it really is I don't know which ones. They are because this, uh, if Kant read it, he would be delighted, a pietist also
speaking, and then he praises the conditions of material life that they have never exercised, because I already
said, I would give them a plot of land of 100 hectares, and now I say, start tilling the land. 100 hectares and and
then Tell me about beatus sile eh get to work 100 hectares of grape corn or whatever. Go
do the harvest but go do the harvest not to take a calendar photo eh But to
live off the wine you produce Of course because another question and this is what I mean by Epicurus Epicurus
said well we have a garden we have a garden look look let's see one thing is to plant
a lentil and another thing is to plant 100 hectares of lentils because planting a lentil is playing
what they played in the association that is free of education in the free institution of education it is
an association of bourgeois in the student residence They had a garden not of These
were the precedents of today's urban gardens where people had a square meter and planted
a lettuce and then there were Lorca Juan Ramón Jiménez and a few others watching to see how
the plant grew. lettuce and they were very excited about playing the farmers planted a greenery
and they were ecstatic Oh, nature, the wonder How the greenery grows How the
lettuce grows no no Start planting 100 hectares 100 hectares, set up a greenhouse
and start planting 100 hectares of agricultural products and then they compose the sonnet of the beatus
sile to see if instead of a lyrical poem we get a social novel eh Because it's very nice
to play the peasants childishly or childishly With a little straw hat and a and a little
white suit and a cute little tie and take a photo and say the student residence then go play
the piano it's very nice that's very nice and play the piano with Manuel de falla as a teacher and such and
such and the student residence is very good That is very nice and the spiritual life and everything
that when you have money everything is very good another thing is having to plant 100 hectares of
wheat, cereals and living on whatever comes your way and a storm, a storm, a
flood comes to you and ruins everything. Let's see where the issue of the beatus is. The truth is in this paradox,
but there is also something very worse, much more cynical still in the literary treatment of
these matters. Of course, the praise of retired life has a literary genealogy in love in the
love of nature or in the love of man in the panfilis moo in the love of everything that gives rise to the
lyrical novel years and leagues of Gabriel Miro or all of Azorín's lyrical novels does not come from Nothing
It evidently comes from a literary antecedent which is the praise of this retired life, the praise of
a world where Sigüenza walks in years and leagues contemplating How the clouds move
and of course all this is saved naturally by a whole literary craft that Gabriel Miro
knows perfectly well how to write all of Azorín's novels in a novel like the will and in
so many other trunt of Spain hours of Spain eh a little blue town That is to say, those
titles are so Azorean lyrical novels of course the nature in this type of poems When love
is projected towards nature we have the pastoral novel The all the bucolic ones from Virgil
Horacio all the seven books of Diana etcetera etcetera that Cervantes greatly demystifies it
when
he presents pastoral figures that completely distort this tradition and then of course
when this love is projected towards metaphysics or the afterlife.
A curious thing is that it is the shepherd who does not suffer, not because when the goatherds make an appearance,
realism is manifested a little more when they are not shepherds. Of course, it is one thing to be a shepherd and another
thing to be a goatherd, even in the pastoral novel itself. There are differences Marcela is a shepherdess
but she is not a Cabrera of course to talk about Marcela as Cabrera first you have to make sure very well
that the suffix is Cabrera and not something else it is not going to be eh something else because the augmentative
of goat is very ugly no Marcela is not going to be the augmentative of the goat So it is better that
it is not Cabrera than that it is Pastora, it is much softer to talk about the shepherdess Cabrera to talk about the Cabrera
Marcela is not the same as to talk about the shepherdess Marcela So The topic changes a lot, not the
speech of the golden age of Don Quixote, it is before some goatherds, not before some
shepherds .
pastoral novel and when it is a subject who hears the grass grow
or sees the clouds passing, then in the lyrical novel we arrive at that bulia, that exaltation of
bulia completely, but in the case of Quevedo in the In Quevedo's case there is not so much a tendency towards
mysticism nor a praise for the pastoral nor a lyrical novel, there is a meditation on death
that has its roots in squist philosophy, a meditatio mortis And this is very good This is very good
because of course It is assumed that those who meditate on death when they come to it
do so with more virtuosity and with more freedom than those who have not meditated on death. It is as if the
poor, when they die, die with more dignity than the rich, of course. This is a message absolutely
contrary to that of classical tragedy by virtue of which in classical tragedy the
noble protagonists Monarchs die with a dignity that the poor lack, however the meditatio
mortis introduces the concept of tragedy, a type of death that is not manifests even Cervantes And
that Seneca wrote a few tragedies but in none of them the rich die with the
medito mortis that characterizes Cervantes's Numantines because the first dignity that
Humble beings find in Tragic death is given to Cervantes, not Seneca, even though Seneka
preached, but Seneca preached for the nobles with whom he lived, not for the lower class that he never
knew and whom he always despised because of the cynicism of many of these intellectuals
who say possessing a series of virtues that identify with Humble beings is a
rampant cynicism since they, like Ortega y Gasset, greatly despise everything that is not
part of a Select minority designed his image and likeness then of course according to Seneca and that I see
these approaches the meditatio mortis is characterized by a disdain towards death
that is interpreted as a virtue let's see death doesn't give a damn whether you disdain it
or not death will to come as the Treasury always comes and will take care of you regardless of what
Whether you think about death or about the Treasury, it doesn't matter to the Treasury inspector or to the
person who carries the scythe, it doesn't matter to the fact that you feel more or
less virtuous, more or less worthy, when it comes to Dying is something that is very difficult for death,
now if you feel more comfortable dressing up as Seneca by putting on a tunic, that
's another part of the narcissism of meditatio mortis, oo better. Still Socrates taking the
hemlock and Borge Salado taking notes to later tell it is not saying hey Odin sacrificing himself
etcetera etcetera Christ crucified all these divinities that die narcissist is also a
surprising thing because they have to be as the song said The bride at the wedding the child at
the baptism and the dead at the funeral we go and the God in the sacrifice there is no other then there is the
praise of misery the poor person is supposed to die with more dignity than the Rich because the rich fear
death because it makes him lose his wealth. While the poor know that through
death he will have a kind of compensation in a superior eternal life, these are
complete and absolute imaginations in definitively that praise of misery as the one that gives you superpowers
to face death and assume it with more dignity than the Rich this is. Ultimately the
moral condemnation of the superior the moral condemnation of the victor that Nietzsche will say much
later when he is already Spanish literature had said it centuries before and finally another very
senequier virtuous idea or the poor man who is supposed to be more virtuous because he is poor
than the Rich man faces death with more freedom and with less fear this psychologism
this has nothing to do with it. To see death we are all called sooner or later and each
one can decorate this path towards death however they want. Teresa of Jesús said that
I live Because such a high life I hope and I die because I don't die etcetera etcetera well it seems very good to me
That is to say they die because they do not die and to live such a high life is to walk a short day
etcetera etcetera all these types of things that are very nice to write a poem but
life really has very little to do with them all this praise of the retired life all this
praise of the beatus ile locating this beatus ile in a world far from civilization is an
enormously cynical rhetorical pose in which I evidently do not believe. Even if he tells me
that I see it, that is to say even if he tells me that I see Quevedo, we love him very much. and we admire him a lot
as a writer and as a poet But he can be as cynical as any other
poet there has been and because there are poets in this world, as Cervantes said, eh, I asked
Camila, do poets lie or tell the truth and she answers him answers him the otario as poets
do not say it as poets do not say it but they remain as short as they are true. What does
this mean? In short, it means that the poet does not lie or tell the truth, it is that
he uses the artifice of fiction to communicate a series of ideas, Quevedo probably does not believe
what he writes, nor does he believe what he writes because he has not experienced it in his love poems, but
he tells it very well, he also tells it that anyone who is not a very intelligent or very An experienced person
can believe it, but this is called literature. Although its content and procedure
are the same sophistry that philosophy uses to deceive those who do not know
reality, philosophy is only needed by those who do not know reality, those who live. He doesn't need to be
explained how life works. Those who work do not need lessons to survive. Life teaches them
daily to live apart from civilization is not to live, it is to live in a self-deception
that is even greater than the challenge that living facing others poses to human intelligence,
which is working to live facing one another. to others, those who do not work do not mature
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