On March 21, 1890, at a conference dedicated to the siege of Bilbao during the Third Carlist War, Miguel de Unamuno delivered a lecture titled La última guerra carlista como materia poética.Amelina Correa Ramón, Otra novela histórica del carlismo: La sima de Igúzquiza (1888) de Alejandro Sawa, [in:] María de los Angeles Ezama Gil (ed.), Aún aprendo: estudios dedicados al profesor Leonardo Romero Tobar, Zaragoza 2012, , p. 281 It was probably the first-ever attempt to examine the Carlist motive in literature, as for the previous 57 years the subject had been increasingly present in poetry, drama and novel. However, it remains paradoxical that when Unamuno was offering his analysis, the period of great Carlist role in letters was just about to begin. It lasted for some quarter of a century, as until the late 1910s Carlism remained a key theme of numerous monumental works of Spanish literature. Afterward, it lost its appeal as a literary motive, still later reduced to instrumental role during Francoism. Today it enjoys some popularity, though no longer as catalyst of paramount cultural or political discourse; its role is mostly to provide exotic, historical, romantic, and sometimes mysterious setting.
Romanticism The First Carlist War broke out when Spanish Romanticism was in its heyday. The literary response to the conflict was immediate and massive; its key features were propagandistic objectives of both sides and often close follow-up to the events as they were unfolding. Two genres serving as key literary battlefields were poetry and drama, the most adapt ones in terms of responsiveness. On both the Cristinos gained immediate advantage, which in the aftermath of the war became visible also in prose, especially in the nascent novel. On the other hand, the popular oral rural response, which made it to literature once written down in the future, was predominantly pro-Carlist. No Romantic work touching upon the Carlist subject is considered part of the great Spanish literature.
Drama
The 1833 outbreak of the First Carlist War, usually considered the birth moment of Carlism,the birth moment of Carlism is fairly clear: October 2, 1833, around 7 PM. At that time a post official in Talavera de la Reina, Manuel María Gonzalez, gathered his armed men on the town square and raised the "Viva Don Carlos" cry. For detailed discussion compare e.g. Felix Rubio López de la Llave, El pronunciamiento carlista de Talavera de la Reina, Toledo 1987, has almost immediately triggered a literary response. The literary genre which responded first was drama. There were a number of theatrical pieces written as the war was unfolding and it seems that most of them were actually staged, as they served mostly propagandistic purpose of mobilizing support; only few were rather comments to recent or even ongoing events.Ermanno Caldera, Liberalismo y anticarlismo en la dramaturgia romántica, [in:] Crítica Hispanica 16/1 (1994), pp. 103-117 Anti-Carlism clearly prevailed, a phenomenon obviously linked to Cristinos controlling almost all the urban zones, centers of cultural and theatrical life.Caldera 1994, pp. 103-105 Most of the dramas seem to be short, one-act pieces, characterized by strong message and boldly sketched protagonists. Unlike in case of poetry, there is no anthology available. It seems that the anti-Carlist dramas fall into two categories: satiric pieces closely related to recent or ongoing events and dramas in historical setting, advancing a general Liberal outlook and in particular aimed against Inquisition and the Absolutist formula.
Among the writers excelling as authors of satires the one re-appearing in numerous works as the most prominent one is Jose Robreño y Tort. He made his name as author of theatrical pieces already in the mid-1820s; venomous caricatures of "los serviles", e.g. La Regencia de la Seo de Urgell o las desgracias del padre Liborio (1822) might be considered pre-configuration of his later anti-Carlist dramas and perhaps the first pieces of anti-Carlist literature.other Rebreño's anti-serviles dramas penned in the mid-1820s are Tragedia para los serviles y sainete para los liberales, La vuelta del faccioso, Ex expatriado en su patria, Los milicianos de Porrera o Numencia de Cataluña, Manuel Morales Muñoz, Inaugurando la modernidad. Teatro y política en el liberalismo democrático, [in:] Baetica. Estudios de Arte, Geografía e Historia 28 (2006), p. 622 Robreño's brief works written during the conflict were again intended for popular audience and are known to have been played in Barcelona in the 1830s.Pedro Rújula, Una guerra literaria, [in:] Jordi Canal (ed.), Rompecabezas carlistas [insert to La Aventura de la Historia 77/2005], pp. 60-61, Pere Anguera i Nolla, El teatre anticarli de Robrenyo, [in:] Josep María Solé i Sabaté (ed.), Literatura, cultura i carlisme, Barcelona 1995, , pp. 3-21 Another Liberal author of the same genre is Manuel Bretón de los Herreros, recognized for the anti-Carlist comedy El plan de un drama (1835).Gregorio de la Fuente Monge, Introducción. Los estudios sobre el teatro político de la España del siglo XIX, [in:] Historia y Política 29 (2013), p. 21 Among the dramas set in history there is El trovador by Antonio García Gutiérrez (1836), Antonio Pérez y Felipe II by José Muñoz Maldonado (1837), Doña Mencia by Juan Eugenio Hartzenbusch (1838)Fuente Monge 2013, pp. 22-23 and Carlos II el Hechizado by Antonio Gil y Zárate (1837); especially the last one was a success among the public.Fuente Monge 2013, p. 22 The Carlist response is little known; it seems that Carlist values were defended generally "por el teatro conservador católico".Fuente Monge 2013, p. 21 The best known author of this breed is José Vicente Alvarez Perera, high Carlist official during the war and also a poet, author of Calendario del año de 1823full title Calendario del año de 1823 para la ciudad de Oviedo: dispuesto por el observatorio ultra-pirenaico y arreglado á las beatificaciones y canonizaciones hechas por la gran Junta de Oriente and Palabras de un cristiano.Fermín Canella y Secades, Historia de la Universidad de Oviedo y noticias de los establecimientos de enseñanza de su distrito, Oviedo 1873, p. 449 José Zorilla was sympathetic to Carlism and even briefly stayed at the Carlist court, yet in his theatrical pieces he did not touch upon the issue.José Zorilla y el carlismo, [in:] El Matiner Carlí service 31.10.12, available here
Poetry
The poetsthere is an unedited monograph dedicated to the Carlist theme in poetry and covering the period up to the mid-20th century, Melchor Ferrer, Musa carlista: El tema carlista en la poesia, referred after Rafael Gambra, Melchor Ferrer y la ‘Historia del tardicionalismo [sic!] español, Sevilla 1979, p. 4 [in sequence, no pagination in original text] responded to the conflict almost as fast as authors of theatrical pieces did. The conflict and its immediate aftermath produced a spate of rhymed pieces, usually first published in press titles of the era. Alfonso Bullón de Mendoza, who attempted to gather them together but limited his work to authors contemporary to the warfare, arrived at a total of 110 works.Alfonso Bullón de Mendoza, La Primera Guerra Carlista en la Poesía, [in:] Alfonso Bullón de Mendoza, Las Guerras Carlistas, Madrid 1993, , p. 292 Being a historian but not a historian of literature, he refrains from offering philological comment, be it in terms of evaluating quality or discussing style; however, it seems that most items were written with clear propagandistic intentions in mind and that none of them made it to the annals of Spanish poetry. This vast assortmentBullón de Mendoza 1993, pp. 291-419 so far can be analyzed mostly in statistical terms; in terms of genre the poetry remains pretty differentiated, with odes, sonnets, eposes, lyrics, cantos, canciones, anthems, marches, satire and other. In terms of key themes, the ones listed are: military buildup, wartime actions, peace accord, foreign intervention, ideology, personalities, enemy and wartime love.fragmentation referred after Bullón de Mendoza 1993 Some of the items were re-printed in anthologies or personal poetic volumes in the 1840s and 1850s. Following the war victory of Cristinos and then following the coronation of Isabella II a flow of court poetry continued for two decades; in endless volumes various authors used to pay homage first to the regent Maria Christinasee e.g. Cristina. Poesías patrióticas, compuestas y dedicadas a S. M. la Reina Gobernadora (1836) by Francisco Nieto Samaniego, del Burgo 1978, p. 694 and then to the queen and at times made references to peace and prosperity, which reigned thanks to triumph over the Carlists.the collections were frequently related to events marking the royal life, like births, marriages, anniversaries etc, for a sample see e.g. Poética en conmemoración del fausto natalicio de la Princesa de Asturias (1852); an extensive list in Jaime del Burgo, Bibliografia del siglo XIX. Guerras carlistas, Pamplona 1978, , pp. 243-244