Romance sonámbulo

Romance sonámbulo ( somnambulistic romance or hypnotic romance or dream walker romance ), also known under the opening line Verde que te quiero verde , is a surrealist poem by Federico García Lorca .

context

Romance sonámbulo is the most famous poem from Federico García Lorca's collection Romancero gitano , published in 1928 .

At the beginning of the 20th century, artists in many art movements released themselves from the shackles of realism by breaking down shapes into their basic elements - a process known as deconstruction . In the fine arts, the works of Picasso and other Cubists are examples of this. In literature, surrealism offered poets the opportunity to transform familiar everyday structures into fantastic dream images. The collection of poems Primer romancero gitano marks a peak in this development. Lorca used the old word Romance , which originally referred to a narrative form of poetry. Instead of focusing on ongoing action, however, he focused on powerful imagery. With the radical abandonment of linear narrative in favor of pictorial metaphors, the poet reflected the deep political and social changes in the troubled 1920s.

text

Romance sonámbulo	Somnambulistic romance
A Gloria Giner ya Fernando de los Ríos	For Gloria Giner and Fernando de los Ríos
Verde que te quiero verde.	Green as i love you green.
Verde viento. Verdes ramas.	Green wind. Green branches.
El barco sobre la mar	The ship on the sea
y el caballo en la montaña.	and the horse in the mountains.
Con la sombra en la cintura	With shadows on her waistband
ella sueña en su baranda,	she dreams on her porch,
verde carne, pelo verde,	green flesh, green hair,
with ojos de fría plata.	with eyes of cold silver.
Verde que te quiero verde.	Green as i love you green.
Bajo la luna gitana,	Under the Gitano moon
las cosas la están mirando	look at things
y ella no puede mirarlas.	and she can't look at them.
Verde que te quiero verde.	Green as i love you green.
Grandes estrellas de escarcha,	Big stars made of hoarfrost
vienes con el pez de sombra	come with the fish of the shadow,
que abre el camino del alba.	that paves the way for dawn.
La higuera frota su viento	The fig tree rubs its wind
con la lija de sus ramas,	on the sand of its branches,
y el monte, gato garduño,	and the mountain, the thieving cat,
eriza sus pitas agrias.	resists its coarse agaves.
Pero ¿quién vendrá? ¿Y por dónde ...?	But who is coming? And from where?
Ella sigue en su baranda,	She stays on her porch
verde carne, pelo verde,	green flesh, green hair,
soñando en la mar amarga.	Dreaming in the bitter sea.
Compadre, quiero cambiar	My friend, I want to trade
mi caballo por su casa,	my horse against your house,
mi montura por su espejo,	my bridle against your mirror,
mi cuchillo por su manta.	my knife against your ceiling.
Compadre, vengo sangrando,	My friend, I come bleeding
desde los montes de Cabra.	from the mountains of Cabras.
Si yo pudiera, mocito,	If i could boy
ese trato se cerraba.	this deal would be decided.
Pero yo ya no soy yo,	But I'm not me anymore
ni mi casa es ya mi casa.	and my house is no longer my house.
Compadre, quiero morir	My friend, I want to die
decentemente en mi cama.	decent in my bed.
De acero, si puede ser,	Made of iron, if you may
con las sábanas de holanda.	with the linen from Holland.
¿No ves la herida que tengo	Don't you see the wound that I'm bearing
desde el pecho a la garganta?	from chest to throat?
Trescientas rosas morenas	Three hundred dark roses
lleva tu pechera blanca.	on your white shirt front.
Tu sangre rezuma y huele	Your blood oozes and smells
alrededor de tu faja.	around your sash.
Pero yo ya no soy yo,	But I'm not me anymore
ni mi casa es ya mi casa.	and my house is no longer my house.
Dejadme subir al menos	At least let me rise
hasta las altas barandas,	to the high balconies,
dejadme subir, dejadme,	let me rise, let me
hasta las verdes barandas.	to the green balconies.
Barandales de la luna	Railing of the moon
por donde retumba el agua.	of which the water drums.
Ya suben los dos compadres	The two companions are already climbing
hacia las altas barandas.	to the high balconies.
Dejando un rastro de sangre.	Leaving a trail of blood.
Dejando un rastro de lágrimas.	Leaving a trail of tears.
Temblaban en los tejados	The roofs shook
farolillos de hojalata.	small tin lanterns.
Mil panderos de cristal,	A thousand crystal tambourines
herían la madrugada.	held the dawn.
Verde que te quiero verde,	Green as i love you green.
verde viento, verdes ramas.	Green wind. Green branches.
Los dos compadres subieron.	The two companions climbed up.
El largo viento, dejaba	The strong wind let
en la boca un raro gusto	strange taste in mouth
de hiel, de menta y de albahaca.	of bile, of mint and basil.
¡Compadre! ¿Dónde está, dime?	My friend tell me where is
¿Dónde está mi niña amarga?	Where is my bitter daughter
¡Cuántas veces te esperó!	How many times has she waited for you!
¡Cuántas veces te esperara,	How many times she would have waited for you
cara fresca, negro pelo,	fresh face, black hair,
en esta verde baranda!	on that green porch!
Sobre el rostro del aljibe	On the face of the well
se mecía la gitana.	the Gitana swayed.
Verde carne, pelo verde,	Green flesh, green hair
with ojos de fría plata.	with eyes of cold silver.
Un carámbano de luna	An icicle of the moon
la sostiene sobre el agua.	keeps them above the water.
La noche se puso íntima	The night became cozy
como una pequeña plaza.	like a little place.
Guardias civiles borrachos,	Drunken civil guards
en la puerta golpeaban.	knocked on the door.
Verde que te quiero verde.	Green as i love you green.
Verde viento. Verdes ramas.	Green wind. Green branches.
El barco sobre la mar	The ship on the sea
y el caballo en la montaña.	and the horse in the mountains.

analysis

The collection of poems Romancero gitano

→ Main article : Romancero gitano

In the 1920s, starting in France, surrealism also spread to Spain. Artists in Spain found in him a form of expression against the pressure of an outmoded Catholic morality and feudal power structures under the dictatorship of Miguel Primo de Rivera . Through his friendship with Salvador Dalí and trips to Catalonia in the early 1920s, Federico García Lorca gained access to this art direction.

On the other hand, Lorca was a profound expert on the literary tradition of Spain and especially of his Andalusian homeland.

The Romancero gitano , published in 1928, quickly became his most popular lyric work. A romance has eight-syllable verses with assonant rhyme. It offers the poet great freedom because it allows impure rather than perfect rhymes. Traditionally, romance told historical events, often with the aim of preserving or promoting national values. Readers and listeners expected a linear story about a significant person or a special event from the story. It is a specifically Spanish form of dramatic poetry. Romancero gitano breaks with this tradition. García Lorca undermined the traditional affirmative function of the heroic narrative by writing about nameless antiheroes from this people. The experimental surrealist content of the poems deepens this break.

The poem Romance sonámbulo

The four opening lines of the poem correspond to a traditional folk song. This is followed by the description of a dreaming young woman on her veranda. Verses below describe the arrival of a wounded compadre who asks the householder to properly let him die in a bed with sheets. After a brief dispute, the two climb up onto a high balcony. Then the young woman appears on a fountain, her appearance has changed, has become more natural, without this being explained in the poem. Finally the Guardia Civil appears . There is no obvious narrative connection between these sections.

The first two lines are repeated after the fragment with the young woman on the veranda. They appear a third time between the section with the two compadres going up to the balconies and the woman on the fountain. At the end of the poem, the four opening lines are repeated: the poem closes a circle instead of telling a linear plot. The male figures on the one hand and the female figure on the other do not appear once together in a section; there is no obvious interaction between the two men and the woman. Anyone who expects the classic story of the hero who overcomes obstacles in order to emerge as a happy winner in the end will be disappointed. The poem lacks all elements of an "exciting story": It has no clear beginning, no middle section, no end, no development to a dramatic climax and no resolution.

The four opening verses set the tone for the entire poem. The only verb, quiero , establishes a subliminal mood of erotic desire. Green branches are commonly associated with spring, life, and fertility. The attribute green in connection with wind amazes the reader, what this could have to do with fertility and sexuality? In strange contrast to this paradoxical picture are the following two verses, which name a ship and a horse - exactly where one would expect them. The color green in connection with the young woman stands for youth, freshness and attractiveness. The association with green hair and green flesh, however, is paradoxical and repulsive. Attributes like eyes made of cold silver and bitter represent rejection and frustration. García Lorca uses the color green more frequently in his poems, usually in a similarly ambivalent manner as in this one.

Extensive sexual symbolism was interpreted into the images in the poem. At García Lorca, green also stands for homosexual desire. The ship stands for the female body, the sea for both fertility and death. The horse symbolizes the male libido and the mountains stand for wilderness and freedom. The rubbing of twigs in the wind stands for masturbation , the water running down from the moon for sexual relief. The Guardia Civil stood for the forces of oppression, social roles and conventions. Taken together, these images suggest sublime sexuality and frustration.

An example of García Lorca's brilliant and original imagery are the two lines that describe a mountain landscape, probably the mountains around Granada. At dawn the ridge looks like the round back of a dark tomcat, the agaves on the mountain like the pointed hairs of the bristling fur; insidious, heralding a danger:

El monte, gato garduño
eriza sus pitas agrias.

No other poem from the Romancero Gitano generated more controversy and speculation than Romance sonámbulo . Part of the readership insists that the poem tell a plot. The following interpretations were suggested:

• It tells of a wounded smuggler who, coming from the port of Cabra , seeks refuge in the house of his lover and her father. In the end, he and the woman were dead and the Guardia Civil knocked on the door.
• It tells the story of a moonstruck Gitana.
• Gustavo Correa sees the whole collection of poems as the life and suffering of a Gitana, and Romance sonámbulo as part of it.
• Others see it as the nightmare of two lovers who seek each other in a dream or in delirium.
• Luis Beltrán Fernández de los Rios saw it as the story of a Gitana whose husband dies in the mountains and who then kills herself.
• Rupert Allen's approach to explanation is based on the refusal of one man to take the wounded newcomer in and let him die in bed. It is the story of an unfaithful woman who was murdered by her husband. The fatally wounded newcomer is her lover. Together, the two men went up to the terrace where the dead woman was lying.
• One philosophical interpretation sees two friends who want to climb the heights of liberation from everyday fears. The Guardia Civil's knock on the door brings them back to everyday life.
• A psychoanalytic interpretation sees the three components of a personality in the three figures young woman, young man and older man: the id , the ego and the superego . The wise older man leads the young man up, which stands for the fact that he introduces him into his unconscious so that he can gain psychological integrity.

García Lorca himself refused that there was a clear reading of his poem:

"Es un hecho poético puro del fondo andaluz y siempre tendra luces cambiantes, aun para el hombre que lo ha comunicado, que soy yo."

"It is a purely poetic object of Andalusian origin that will always shine in changing light, even to the man who conveyed it and who I am."

- Federico García Lorca

With the multitude of interpretations, the critics have involuntarily shown that no one can clearly tell the story of Romance sonámbulo . There is much to suggest that it is about García Lorca's personal tragedy, his pursuit of freedom, his desire and his frustration. Since the laws and social conventions did not allow him to communicate this directly, he sought expression in symbols and emotional images. The symbolism and the deconstruction of the narrative form allowed him to present this in a romance in which such content would otherwise have been impossible.

Musical adaptations

The poem was arranged in different versions as a vocal piece. An interpretation as a dance song can be found in Carlos Saura's film Flamenco from 1995. Another well-known interpretation was sung by Ana Belén and Manzanita . A free variation appears in the soundtrack of the second season of the Netflix series Casa de papel.

Web links

• Federico García Lorca: Romance sonámbulo. (Recitation) In: YouTube . June 19, 2010, accessed January 16, 2016 (Spanish, Spokesperson: Jorge Mistral). 

References and comments

1. ↑ Federico Garcia Lorca: The poems . Ed .: Ernst Rudin, José Manuel López de Abiada. tape I . Wallstein-Verlag, Göttingen 2008, ISBN 978-3-89244-961-4 , p. 305 (Spanish, German, original title: Primer romancero gitano . Translated by Enrique Beck ).
2. ↑ Federico Garcia Lorca: Gypsy Romances. Primer romancero gitano . Suhrkamp, ​​Frankfurt am Main 2002, ISBN 978-3-518-22356-7 , pp. 21 (Spanish, German, original title: Primer romancero gitano . Translated by Martin von Koppenfels ).
3. ↑ Federico García Lorca: Poemas / Gedichte . Reclam, Ditzingen 2007, ISBN 978-3-15-018480-6 , pp. 50 (Spanish, German, edited, commented and translated by Gustav Siebenmann).
4. ^ ^{A b} Frieda H. Blackwell: Deconstructing Narrative. Lorca's Romancero gitano and the Romance sonámbulo . In: Centro Virtual Cervantes (Ed.): Cauce . Literatura. No. 26 , 2003, p. 31 ( cvc.cervantes.es [PDF; accessed on January 28, 2016]).
5. ↑ Since the poet died more than 70 years ago, the Spanish text is in the public domain .
6. ↑ The translation is based closely on the Spanish text. The translations by Enrique Beck or Martin von Koppenfels are not reproduced here due to copyright law
7. ↑ Enrique Beck translates with her house ; d. H. the young woman's house, not that of the Compadre . Both translations are possible, see the editor's note in Federico Garcia Lorca: Die Gedichte . (Spanish German).
8. ^ Frieda H. Blackwell: Deconstructing Narrative . S. 33 .
9. ^ Frieda H. Blackwell: Deconstructing Narrative . S. 34 .
10. ^ Frieda H. Blackwell: Deconstructing Narrative . S. 35 .
11. ^ Frieda H. Blackwell: Deconstructing Narrative . S. 36 .
12. ^ Frieda H. Blackwell: Deconstructing Narrative . S. 37-38 .
13. ^ ^{A b} Frieda H. Blackwell: Deconstructing Narrative . S. 38 .
14. ↑ Enrique Beck translated carne with skin .
15. ^ Robert G. Havard: The Symbolic Ambivalence of "Green" in García Lorca and Dylan Thomas . In: Modern Humanities Research Association (Ed.): The Modern Language Review . tape 67 , no. 4 , October 1972, p. 810 , doi : 10.2307 / 3724499 , JSTOR : 3724499 .
16. ^ Frieda H. Blackwell: Deconstructing Narrative . S. 40 .
17. ^ Frieda H. Blackwell: Deconstructing Narrative . S. 43 .
18. ^ Frieda H. Blackwell: Deconstructing Narrative . S. 41 .
19. ^ ^{A b} Frieda H. Blackwell: Deconstructing Narrative . S. 37 .
20. ^ Frieda H. Blackwell: Deconstructing Narrative . S. 39-40 .
21. ^ Frieda H. Blackwell: Deconstructing Narrative . S. 44 .
22. ^ Carlos Saura: Flamenco. (Video) In: YouTube. March 9, 2013, accessed on January 28, 2016 (Spanish, Romance sonámbulo from 1:29:30). 
23. ^ Ana Belén and Manzanita: Romance sonámbulo. (Video) directo. In: YouTube. November 8, 2008, Retrieved January 28, 2016 (Spanish). 
24. ^ Verde que te quiero verde - La casa de papel - Letra. Uploaded by Music & Music. In: Youtube. March 28, 2018, Retrieved July 23, 2019 (Spanish).