AP Spanish Lit Midterm Review

Don Juan Manuel, Conde Lucanor, Exemplo XXXV ("De lo que aconteció a un mozo que casó con una mujer muy fuerte y muy brava")

About a young man who marries a fierce, aggressive woman and tames her on their wedding night by brutally killing a dog, cat, and horse, demonstrating his own power

Anónimo, "Romance de la pérdida de Alhama“

A 15th-century Spanish ballad that recounts the fall of the Muslim stronghold of Alhama to the Christian forces during the Reconquista

Hernán Cortés, "Segunda carta de relación"

Relates his trips to Mexico and the Fall of Mexico-Tenochtitlán

Miguel León-Portilla, Visión de los vencidos

Translated selections of Nahuatl-language accounts of the Spanish conquest of the Aztec Empire

Garcilaso de la Vega, Soneto XXIII ("En tanto que de rosa y azucena")

Celebrates the beauty of a young woman, urging her to enjoy her youth before it fades

Luis de Góngora, Soneto CLXVI ("Mientras por competir con tu cabello")

Themes of love, beauty, and awareness of mortality

Anónimo, Lazarillo de Tormes

The first book establishing the style of the picaresque satirical novel

Francisco de Quevedo, Salmo XVII ("Miré los muros de la patria mía")

Explores the themes of exile and longing for one’s home country

Miguel de Cervantes, Don Quijote

Revolves around the adventures of a member of the lowest nobility, who reads so many chivalric romances that he loses his mind and decides to become a knight-errant

Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz, "Hombres necios que acusáis"

Explores the double standards of men while also accusing men of trying to diminish a woman's honor

Tirso de Molina, El burlador de Sevilla y convidado de piedra

The earliest fully developed dramatization of the Don Juan legend

José María Heredia, "En una tempestad"

Uses a violent storm as a powerful metaphor for the internal struggles and tumultuous emotions of the poet

Gustavo Adolfo Bécquer, Rima LIII ("Volverán las oscuras golondrinas")

Tackles themes of lost love and the fleeting quality of happiness

Emilia Pardo Bazán, "Las medias rojas"

Captures the struggles of a young woman seeking freedom and independence in a harsh, oppressive environment

Horacio Quiroga, “El hijo”

A father hallucinates his dead son