Major Figures in Spanish Culture

Nov 08 2023 14 ep. 27 mins 20

Major Figures in Spanish Culture Podcast artwork

Renowned experts profile prominent figures that have contributed in a decisive way to the advancement of Spanish culture.

Society & Culture

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13. Tomás Luis de Victoria

Nov 08 2023 27 mins

Owen L. Rees, a professor of Music at the University of Oxford and a Fellow in Music and Organist (Director of Music) at The Queen's College, University of Oxford, speaks about Tomás Luis de Victoria (1548–1611), a renowned Spanish Renaissance composer celebrated for his choral music, known for its harmonies and profound spiritual expression. BOOKS AND PUBLICATIONS ABOUT TOMÁS

12. Lope de Vega

Nov 02 2023 28 mins

Jonathan Thacker, the King Alfonso XIII Professor of Spanish Studies and a Fellow of Exeter College at the University of Oxford, discusses Lope de Vega (1562–1635), a playwright and poet who played a crucial role in Spanish literature during the Golden Age. He was a contemporary of Cervantes and Shakespeare, and he authored as many as 800 plays and numerous poems, making substant

11. Manuel de Falla

Oct 25 2023 34 mins

Michael Christoforidis, a Professor of Musicology at the Melbourne Conservatorium of Music, University of Melbourne, discusses Manuel de Falla (1876–1946), a pivotal figure in Spanish culture during the Silver Age and arguably one of Spain's most renowned composers. He achieved widespread recognition in a country more famous for its literary and visual artists. Falla's music effe

10. Rosalía de Castro

Oct 18 2023 27 mins

Catherine Davies, emérita professor of Hispanic and Latin American Studies at the University of London, talks about Rosalía de Castro (1837–1885), one of Spain’s finest lyrical poets, certainly the most loved and admired of the nineteenth century. Rosalía de Castro ushered in a new era of modern poetry in Spain, and left an enduring legacy in Spanish literature. She was, as

9. Federico García Lorca

Jul 21 2021 33 mins

Federico García Lorca is Spain’s best known and perhaps most beloved poet of the 20th century. Born in 1898, Lorca formed friendships in Madrid with a pleiade of young creators in the 1920s at the Residencia de Estudiantes, al of whom would become very influential in Spanish culture. He was killed by Nacionalist forces at the beginning of the Spanish Civil War when he was only 3

8. María Zambrano

Jul 01 2021 29 mins

A Spanish Civil War exile from 1939 until 1984, María Zambrano was a philosopher and essayist that combined civic commitment and poetic thought. A disciple of José Ortega y Gasset, she received the two highest literary awards granted in Spain: the Prince of Asturias Award in 1981, and the Cervantes Award in 1988. Roberta Johnson, Professor Emerita of the Department of Spanish &am

07. Antonio Machado

May 26 2021 22 mins

Antonio Machado was part of the Generation of 1898, a group of writers that were concerned about Spain’s position in the modern world and wrote to inspire people to reassess their values in order to awaken a national consciousness. Unlike his contemporaries, Machado adopted what he called “eternal poetry,” which was based more on reflection and intuition, than on intellect. N

06. Miguel de Cervantes

Apr 28 2021 37 mins

Miguel de Cervantes’ daring in literary experimentation was both perfectly suited to the time in which he lived, and an exponential step forward in literary art, specifically in the genre he perfected, the modern novel. Susan Byrne, Professor of Hispanic Studies and Chair of the Department of World Languages and Cultures at the University of Nevada-Las Vegas introduces in this po

05. Juan Ramón Jiménez

Mar 17 2021 27 mins

Many Spanish-language poets, from Lorca to Pablo Neruda or Octavio Paz are indebted to the work of Juan Ramón Jiménez, Spanish poet who received the Nobel Prize of Literature en 1956. He is a rare creator of pure, lyrical texts that express the essence of poety. Julio Jensen, Associate Professor in the Department of English, Germanic and Romance Studies at the University of Copen

04. José Ortega y Gasset

Feb 17 2021 40 mins

Above all a philosopher, José Ortega y Gasset enunciated the seminal idea of his thought in this sentence: “I am myself and my circumstance, and if I don’t save it, I don’t save myself”. In this podcast, Juan Pablo Fusi, Professor Emeritus of Contemporary History at Madrid’s Universidad Complutense, talks about this outstanding figure in Spanish culture that tried to mak