Antonio Machado
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Antonio Machado
Machado was born in
Seville one year after his
brother
Manuel. The family moved to
Madrid in
1883 and both brothers
enrolled in the Institución
Libre de Enseñanza. During these
years, and with the
encouragement of his teachers,
Antonio discovered his passion
for literature.
While completing his
Bachillerato in
Madrid, economic
difficulties forced him to take
several jobs including working
as an actor. In 1899 he
travelled with his brother to
Paris to work as translators
for a French publisher. During
these months in Paris he came
into contact with the great
French
Symbolist poets
Jean Moréas,
Paul Fort and
Paul Verlaine, and also with
other contemporary literary
figures, including
Rubén Darío and
Oscar Wilde. These
encounters cemented Machado's
decision to dedicate himself to
poetry.
In 1901 he had his first poems
published in the literary
journal 'Electra'. His first
book of
poetry was published in 1903
with the title Soledades.
Over the next few years he
gradually amended the
collection, removing some and
adding many more, and in 1907
the definitive collection was
published with the title
Soledades. Galerías. Otros
Poemas.
In the same year Machado was
offered the job of Professor of
French at the school in
Soria. Here he met Leonor
Izquierdo, daughter of the
owners of the boarding house
Machado was staying in. They
were married in 1909: he was 34;
Leonor was 15. Early in 1911 the
couple went to live in Paris
where Machado read more
French literature and
studied
philosophy. In the summer
however Leonor was diagnosed
with advanced
tuberculosis and they
returned to Spain. On
1 August
1912 Leonor died, just a few
weeks after the publication of
Campos de Castilla.
Machado was devastated and left
Soria, the city that had
inspired the poetry of Campos,
never to return. He went to live
in
Baeza,
Andalucia, where he stayed
until 1919. Here he wrote a
series of poems dealing with the
death of Leonor which were added
to a new (and now definitive)
edition of Campos de Castilla
published in 1916 along with the
first edition of Nuevas
canciones
While his earlier poems are in
an ornate, Modernist style, with
the publication of "Campos de
Castilla" he showed an evolution
toward greater simplicity, a
characteristic that was to
distingush his poetry from then
on.
Between 1919 and 1931 Machado
was Professor of French in
Segovia. He moved here to be
nearer to Madrid, where Manuel
lived. The brothers would meet
at weekends to work together on
a number of plays, the
performances of which earned
them great popularity. It was
here also that Antonio had a
secret affair with Pilar
Valderrama, a married woman with
three children, to whom he would
refer in his work by the name
Guiomar.
When
Francisco Franco launched
his coup d'état in July 1936,
launching the
Spanish Civil War, Machado
was in Madrid. The coup was to
separate him forever from his
brother Manuel who was trapped
in the Nationalist (Francoist)
zone, and from Valderrama who
was in
Portugal. Machado was
evacuated with his elderly
mother and uncle to
Valencia, and then to
Barcelona in 1938. Finally,
as Franco closed in on the last
Republican strongholds, they
were obliged to move across the
French border to
Collioure. It was here, on
22 February
1939 that Antonio Machado
died, just three days before his
mother.
Machado is buried in Colliore
where he died; Leonor is buried
in Soria.
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