Poetry
The Student of Salamanca
El estudiante de Salamanca
José de Espronceda · 1840
Opening lines
Era más de media noche,
Antiguas historias cuentan,
Cuando, en sueño y en silencio
Lóbrego envuelta la tierra,
Los vivos muertos parecen,
Los muertos la tumba dejan.
It was past midnight,
So old stories tell,
When, wrapped in sleep and in gloomy
Silence, the earth lies,
The living seem dead,
The dead leave the tomb.
Translation by Erostrate
Text quoted from gutenberg.org
Synopsis
One night, in the streets of Salamanca, two men cross swords. Then appears don Félix de Montemar, an impious, gambling and arrogant seducer, whom the poem presents as a second Don Juan Tenorio. Elvira, whom he seduced with a promise of marriage and then abandoned, pours out her lament and dies of love, leaving a letter. At a gaming table, Montemar stakes objects that came from her, including her portrait; it is then that don Diego, the young woman's brother, appears, come to avenge her.
Context
Fragments appeared in journals from the end of the 1830s, before the complete version, published in 1840 in the collection Poesías. The poem runs to a little over 1,700 lines, in four unequal parts, and often changes metre. The author takes up the legend of Don Juan and other motifs from popular tradition, and mixes narrative poetry with dialogue scenes, which made the text an avant-garde work for its time.
Who it is for
A narrative poem in four parts, which moves from verse narrative to dialogue scenes as in the theatre.
Prizes and reception
Translated into French by Raymond Foulché-Delbosc in 1893, a translation reissued in 1986, and into English by C. K. Davies in 1991.