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statement of real events. During the golden age of
Spanish letters both Cervantes and Lopo de Vega
praise a number of Peruvian poets. An unknown
poetess of Huanueo, writing under the name of
Amarilis, produced in her verses, addressed to Lope
de Vega and praising him, the best poetical composi-
tions of the early colonial time in Peru. Lope re-
sponded with his epistle, "Belardo d Amarilis".
Another anonymous poetess of this period WTote in
terzarima a "Discurso en loor de la poesia" in which
she recordsthe names of contemporary Peruvian poets.
An Andalusian colouring was given to composition in
Peru during the latter part of the sixteenth century
and the early years of the seventeenth by the presence
on her soil of certain Spanish writers hailing especially
from Seville; among those were Diego Mexia, Diego
de Ojeda, and Luis de Belmonte.
Gongorism penetrated into Peru as everywhere else in the Spanish-speaking world, and found a defender there in the person of Juan de Espinosa Medrano. An impetus was given to poetical composition by a Viceroy of Peru, the Marques de Castell-dos-Rius (d. 1710), who had gatherings at liis palace every Monday evening at which the invited litterateurs would recite their poems. A number of these poems appeared in the volume styled "Florde Academias". A conspicuous member of the coterie thus formed was Luis Antonio de Oviedo-Herrera, the author of two long religious poems. A poem, "Lima fundada", and several dramas, especially "Kotloguna" an adapta- tion of Corneille's French play, are to be put to the credit of Pedro de Peralta Barnuevo (109.5-1743), who combined with his activity in the field of belles- lettres much labour in the world of scholarship, win- ning renown as an historian and also as a geometri- cian and jurisconsult. Pablo Antonio de Olavide (1725-180.3) was a Peruvian who went to the mother- land and played a leading part in the Court of Charles III, to whom he suggested certain agricultural reforms. To literature he contributed the pro.se doc- ument, "'El Evangelio en triunfo", in which, as a good CathoUc, he makes amends for earlier indiscretions.
As a resuit of later geographical divisions, Olmedo, one of the very greatest of Spanish-American writers, became eventually a citizen of Ecuador and he will therefore be considered in connexion with the litera- ture of that state. Mariano Melgar (1719-1814; shot by the Spaniards) attracted some attention by his endeavour to reproduce in Spanish the spirit of the yaran, a lyric form of the native Quichua or language of the Incas. Next in importance to Olme- do as a poet among those born in the land is Felipe Pardo y Aliaga (180()-68). Trained in Spain by Alberto Lista, he shared the con.servative and classic feelings of that poet and teacher. His pohtical satires and his comedies of manners are clever and interesting. Of the nature of the modern genero chico are the little farces of Manuel Ascensio Segura (180.5-71). With much imitation of Espronceda and ZorilLa and with considerable echoing of the manner of Lamartine and of Victor Hugo, there was inaugu- rated about 1848 a romantic movement. The leader in this was a Spaniard from Santander, Fernando Velarde, around whom gathered a number of young enthusiasts. These copied Velarde's own method as well as those of the great foreign romanticists. Among them were: Manuel Castillo (1814-70) of Arequipa; Manuel Nicolds Corpancho (18.30-63), who met an untimely fate by shipwreck; Carlos Augusto Salavcrry (1830-91); Manuel Adolfo Garcia (1829-83), the author of a noted ode to Bolivar; Clement .Althaus (183.5-91); and Constantino Carr.as- co (1841-87), who put into Spanish verse the native Quichua drama, "Ollantay". With respect to the original play in Quichua it was long thought to be entirely of native origin, but now the critics tend to believe that it is an imitation of the Si)anisli classical
drama written in the Quichua language by a Spanish
missionary in the region. In an artificial way Qui-
chua verse is stOl cultivated in Peru and Ecuador.
Allied in spirit to the foregoing romanticists is Ricardo
Palma, who owes his fame to his prose, "Tradiciones
peruanas", r.athcr than to his verse. The more re-
cent writers have undergone in no slight measure the
influence of French decadent i.sm and symbolism; a
good example of them is Jose S. Choeano (1867-1900).
Ecuador. — This region belonged to the Viceroyalty of Peru until 1721. Thereafter it was governed from Bogotd. until 1824, when Southern Ecuador was annexed to the first Colombia. In 1830 it became a separate state. The first colleges were established in Ecuador about the middle of the sixteenth century by the Franciscans for the natives, and by the Jesuits, as elsewhere in America, for the sons of Spaniards. Some chronicles by clerical ^Titers and other explorers were written during the earlier colonial period, but no poetical writing appeared before the seventeenth century. The Jesuit Jacinto de Evia, a native of Guayaquil, pub- hshed at ^lachid in 1675 a "Rami- llete de varias flores porticas" etc., containing a number' of Gon- goristic composi- tions due to him- self and to two other versifiers, a Jesuit from Sev- ille, Antonio Bastidas, and a native of Bogotd, Hernando Dom- inguez Canargo. The best verses of the eighteenth century were col- lected by the priest Juan Ve- lasco (b. 1727; d. in Italy, 1819) and pubhshed in six volumes with the title of "Colecci6n de poesias hecha por un ocioso en la ciudad de Faenza". These volumes contained poems by Bautista Aguirre of Guayaquil, Jos6 Orozco (b. 1773; author of an epic, "La conquista de Menorca", which is not without its graceful passages), Ram6n Viescas and others, chiefly Jesuits. The Jesuits spared no effort to pro- mote literary culture here and elsewhere in Spanish- America during the whole period dowai to 1767. The expulsion of them in that year, causing as it did the closing of several colleges, impeded great l.\' the work of classical education. To scientific study an incen- tive had been given alreac ly b v t he advent into the land of certain French and S]):inisli scholars who came to measure a. degree of the (■:irlli's surface at the equator. A still further impetus to inquiry and reseai'ch was given by the arrival of Humboldt in 1801. By 1779 the native doctor and surgeon, Francisco Eugenio de Santa Cruz y Espejo (1740-96), had written his " Nuevo Luciano ", assailing t he prevailing iHlucat ional and economic systems and repeating ideas which the Benedictine Feij6o had already put forth in Spain.
As has been said above, Ecuador has given to Spanish-.\merica one of her most gifted poets, Jos6 Joaquin de Olmedo of Guayaquil (178()-1S47). Out of all the .Spanish-.Vmerican poetical writers there can be ranked with him only two others, the Venezuelan Bello and the Cuban Heredia. Guayaquil was still part of Peru when Olmedo was born, but he identified himself rather with the fortunes of Ecuador when his native pl.ace was permanently incorporated into that state. In form and spirit, which are semi-cla,ssic.al, Olmedo reminds us of the Spanish poet Quintana,
Joa£ Celestino Mutis
