The first Iberian pastoral romance, a feminine narrative that is a revealing meditation on love and longing

The Spanish Arcadia analyzes the figure of the shepherd in the sixteenth- and seventeenth-century Spanish imaginary, exploring its centrality to the discourses on racial, cultural, and religious identity. Drawing on a wide range of documents, including theological polemics on blood purity, political treatises, manuals on animal husbandry, historiography, paintings, epic poems, and Spanish ballads, Javier Irigoyen-García argues that the figure of the shepherd takes on extraordinary importance in the reshaping of early modern Spanish identity. The Spanish Arcadia contextualizes pastoral romances within a broader framework and assesses how they inform other cultural manifestations. In doing so, Irigoyen-García provides incisive new ideas about the social and ethnocentric uses of the genre, as well as its interrelation with ideas of race, animal husbandry, and nation building in early modern Spain.

The Spanish Arcadia analyzes the figure of the shepherd in the sixteenth- and seventeenth-century Spanish imaginary, exploring its centrality to the discourses on racial, cultural, and religious identity. Drawing on a wide range of documents, including theological polemics on blood purity, political treatises, manuals on animal husbandry, historiography, paintings, epic poems, and Spanish ballads, Javier Irigoyen-García argues that the figure of the shepherd takes on extraordinary importance in the reshaping of early modern Spanish identity. The Spanish Arcadia contextualizes pastoral romances within a broader framework and assesses how they inform other cultural manifestations. In doing so, Irigoyen-García provides incisive new ideas about the social and ethnocentric uses of the genre, as well as its interrelation with ideas of race, animal husbandry, and nation building in early modern Spain.

Excerpt from The Spanish Pastoral Romances The first edition of this work was accepted by the faculty of the University of Freiburg i. B. as a dissertation for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in 1891, and was published in Baltimore in the following year. In its day it was not unfavorably received, and as it has long since been out of print, it has seemed that a new edition might not be unwelcome. In the long period that has intervened the Pastoral Romance never entirely lost for me its old attraction, and as I gradually acquired many of the early editions of these works and re-read them, I determined to re-issue these "primicias de mi corto ingenio," adding such new facts as subsequent researches had brought to light. The result is the present work, which has been almost entirely rewritten, and now appears, as I hope, in a much improved form. I have not seen fit to change, in any material degree, the opinions originally expressed concerning the various romances; repeated reading has convinced me more than ever that the Diana of Montemayor, which was the first, is also the best of these pastorals, while it has increased my admiration for the poetical portions of the Arcadia of Lope de Vega. The Pastoral Romance was essayed by some of the greatest ingenios that Spain has produced, and while many of these poets "had no true vocation for the business," as Professor Fitzmaurice-Kelly says of Cervantes, and, as a consequence, their works are of widely varying degrees of merit, yet they cannot be entirely neglected by the student, for the pastoral is a product of the most flourishing period of Spanish literature, - a literature unsurpassed by any in the modern world. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

Eisenberg's book dealing with the Spanish Romances of chivalry, the most popular fiction of the Spanish Renaissance, and the preferred reading of Don Quijote, is finally back in print. Originally published in 1982, this important work has been out of print for a number of years. "Dan Eisenberg's work is our best source of knowledge about the Spanish romances of chivalry." -Sydney P. Cravens Texas Tech University "Daniel Eisenberg tiene un profundo conocimiento de los secretos de los libros de caballermas." -Martmn de Riquer Real Academia Espaqola