Julian del Casal

Julian del Casal Poems

Julian del Casal Biography

José Julián Herculano del Casal y de la Lastra (November 7, 1863 – October 21, 1893) was a Cuban poet. He took up many of the French poetic styles of the day, and later influenced Rubén Darío and Modernismo. Like Manuel González Prada and José Martí, Casal was an important forebearer of modernistic expression throughout Latin America. Casal seemed almost obsessed when comparing natural vs "made by man" perspectives. Major Works Casal published only two poetry collections during his lifetime, Hojas al viento and Nieve. His last collection, Bustos y rimas, appeared in 1893, shortly after his death, and was completed with the help of Casal's friend Hernández Miyares. It differs from his earlier works because it contains both prose and poetry. Hojas includes forty-nine poems and is considered an example of Casal's early writing style. The poems in this collection are topical in nature and often refer to contemporary events. A few of them were even characterized as "imitations" and show the influence of other writers. The work was well received by his contemporaries as an early offering by a poet with much promise. Casal continued to publish poems in various Cuban periodicals, and in 1892 he collected many of these pieces in his second collection, Nieve. Divided into five sections, the poems in this collection are categorized according to theme. The first section, "Bocetos antiguos" includes poems inspired by pagan and Judeo-Christian thought; the second section, "Mi museo ideal," is famous because the poems contained in it were inspired by the art of Gustave Moreau, with whom Casal had an ongoing correspondence. The third section, "Cromos españoles," is a collection of well-known Spanish word pictures; the fourth, "Marfiles viejos," contains sixteen sonnets, all reflecting his fears and concerns about life in general. The fifth section, titled "La gruta del ensueño," completes the collection with seventeen miscellaneous poems. Nieve met with some critical success, although most contemporaries in Cuba felt that Casal's themes were too dark and pessimistic.)

The Best Poem Of Julian del Casal

Scene In The Tropics

Insects and dust. A leaden atmosphere
Where loud the clappings of the thunder sound.
Like swans in mud, pure white against a ground
Of ashes, clouds immaculate appear.
The sea has paralyzed its waves, their clear
Green rush is still; above that bosom round
Lightning, within a frame of peace profound,
Lets forth a swift and sudden crimson spear.
Dreamily nods the lazy tree its head;
Deep calm, unbalanced, reels before attack,
And rapid sea gulls rend the air amain.
Across the spacious vault a bolt is sped,
And then upon the earth's great smoking back
Sharply descend the crackling drops of rain.

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