La derrota de los pedantes (1789) de Leandro Fernández de Moratín y la difusión del Neoclasicismo en España

Abstract

Luzán’s Poética (1737) expresses the criteria of the new Spanish Classicism on a theoretical level. By the end of the eighteenth century, Leandro Fernández de Moratín assumed the responsibility of publicizing the principles of Neoclassicism as well as denouncing the extremes of the Baroque aesthetic through his literary works. Lección poética (1782), La derrota de los pedantes (1789) and La comedia nueva o el café were written to explain the theoretical and dramatic discourse of Neoclassicism: the universal concept of rhetoric and its connection to Renaissance models, rationality vs. the extravagances of the Baroque period, the educational function of art and its submission to rules. La derrota de los pedantes is a fictional satire which adopts the convention of the journey to Mount Parnassus. A group of versemongers and poetasters try to break into the place, but they are defeated by Apollo’s friends. Fernández de Moratín sketches the personality of the degraded and negative hero, an icon of aesthetic anarchy and traditional codes. After this description the author contrasts it with the model of Neoclassic virtue proposed by Apollo.