Of all the Spanish poets of the period of Romanticism, Espronceda is the most commanding figure. Piñeyro, adopting Emerson's phrase, calls him the Representative Man of that age of literary and political revolt. More than that, criticism is unanimous in considering him Spain's greatest lyric poet of the nineteenth century.
First of all he interests as the poet of democracy. The Romantic poets were no more zealous seekers for political liberalism than the classic poets of the previous generation had been; but their greater subjectivity and freedom of expression rendered their appeal more vigorous. Espronceda's hatred for absolutism was so intense that in moments of excitement he became almost anti-social. The pirate, the beggar, the Cossack, were his heroes. The love of this dandy for the lower classes cannot be dismissed as mere pose. He keenly sympathized with the oppressed, and felt that wholesale destruction must precede the work of construction. We look in vain for a reasoned political philosophy in his volcanic verse. His outpourings were inspired by the irresponsible ravings of groups of café radicals, and the point of view constantly changed as public sentiment veered. According to his lights he is always a patriot. Liberty and democracy are his chief desires.
Like most Romanticists, Espronceda was intensely subjective. He interests by his frank display of his inner moods. Bonilla, in his illuminating article "El Pensamiento de Espronceda," states that the four essential points in the philosophy of Romanticism were: doubt, the first principle of thought; sorrow, the positive reality of life; pleasure, the world's illusion; death, the negation of the will to live. Espronceda shared all of these ideas. It is often impossible to say how much of his suffering is a mere Byronic pose, and how much comes from the reaction of an intensely sensitive nature to the hard facts of existence. There is evidence that he never lost the zest of living; but in his writings he appears as one who has been completely disillusionized by literature, love, politics, and every experience of life. Truth is the greatest of evils, because truth is always sad; "mentira," on the other hand, is merciful and kind. He carries doubt so far that he doubts his very doubts. Such a philosophy should logically lead to quietism. That pessimism did not in the case of Espronceda bring inaction makes one suspect that it was largely affected. There is nothing profound in this very commonplace philosophy of despair. It is the conventional attitude of hosts of Romanticists who did little but re-echo the Vanitas vanitatum of the author of Ecclesiastes. Espronceda's thought is too shallow to entitle him to rank high as a philosophic poet. In this respect he is inferior even to Campoamor and Núñez de Arce. Genuine world-weariness is the outgrowth of a more complex civilization than that of Spain. Far from being a Leopardi, Espronceda may nevertheless be considered the leading Spanish exponent of the taedium vitae. He has eloquently expressed this commonplace and conventional attitude of mind.
Like so many other writers of the Latin race, Espronceda is more admirable for the form in which he clothed his thoughts than for those thoughts themselves. He wrote little and carefully. He is remarkable for his virtuosity, his harmonious handling of the most varied meters. He never, like Zorrilla, produces the effect of careless improvisation. In the matter of poetic form Espronceda has been the chief inspiration of Spanish poets down to the advent of Rubén Darío. Fitzmaurice-Kelly, with his happy knack of hitting off an author's characteristics in a phrase, says: "He still stirs us with his elemental force, his resonant musical potency of phrase, his communicative ardor for noble causes."
Much harm has been done Espronceda's reputation for originality by those critics who fastened upon him the name of "the Spanish Byron." Nothing could be more unjust than to consider him the slavish imitator of a single author. In literature, as in love, there is safety in numbers, and the writer who was influenced by Calderón, Tasso, Milton, Goethe, Béranger, Hugo, Shakespeare, and Scott was no mere satellite to Byron. Señor Cascales is so sensitive on the point that he is scarcely willing to admit that Byron exerted any influence whatsoever upon Espronceda. The truth is that Byron did influence Espronceda profoundly, as Churchman has sufficiently proved by citing many instances of borrowings from the English poet, where resemblance in matters of detail is wholly conclusive; but it is another matter to assert that Espronceda was always Byronic or had no originality of his own.
In considering Espronceda's writings in detail, we need concern ourselves little with his dramatic and prose writings. The quickest road to literary celebrity was the writing of a successful play. Espronceda seems never to have completely relinquished the hope of achieving such a success. His first attempt was a three-act verse comedy, "Ni el Tío ni el Sobrino" (1834), written in collaboration with Antonio Ros de Olano. Larra censured it for its insipidity and lack of plan. A more ambitious effort was "Amor venga sus agravios" (1838), written in collaboration with Eugenio Moreno López. This was a five-act costume play, in prose, portraying the life at the court of Philip IV. It was produced without regard to expense, but with indifferent success. Espronceda's most ambitious play was never staged, and has only recently become easily accessible: this was "Blanca de Borbón," a historical drama of the times of Peter the Cruel in five acts, in verse. The first two acts were written in Espronceda's early Classic manner; the last three, written at a later period, are Romantic in tone. The influence of "Macbeth" is apparent. "Blanca de Borbón" could never be a success on the stage. The verse, too, is not worthy of the author. Espronceda was too impetuous a writer to comply with the restrictions of dramatic technique. The dramatic passages in "El Estudiante de Salamanca" and "El Diablo Mundo" are his best compositions in dialogue.
"Sancho Saldaña" is Espronceda's most important prose work. It is a historical novel of the thirteenth century, written frankly in imitation of Walter Scott's Waverley Novels. The romance contains many tiresome descriptions of scenery, and drags along tediously as most old-fashioned novels did. But Espronceda had none of Sir Walter's archaeological erudition, none of his ability to seize the characteristics of an epoch, and above all none of his skill as a creator of interesting characters. The personages in "Sancho Saldaña" fail to interest. The most that can be said of the work is that among the numerous imitations of Scott's novels which appeared at the time it is neither the best nor the worst. Of his shorter prose works only two, "De Gibraltar a Lisboa, viaje histórico" and "Un Recuerdo," are easily accessible. They are vivid portrayals of certain episodes of his exile, and may still be read with interest. His most important polemical work is "El Ministerio Mendizábal" (Madrid, 1836). In this screed we find the fiery radical attacking as unsatisfactory the ultra-liberal Mendizábal. This and shorter political articles interest the historian and the biographer, but hardly count as literature. His rare attempts at literary criticism have even less value.
Espronceda shows true greatness only as a lyric poet. For spirit and perfection of form what could be more perfect than the "Canción del Pirata"? Like Byron in the "Corsair," he extols the lawless liberty of the buccaneer. Byron was here his inspiration rather than Hugo. The "Chanson de Pirates" cannot stand comparison with either work. But Espronceda's indebtedness to Byron was in this case very slight. He has made the theme completely his own. "El Mendigo" and "El Canto del Cosaco," both anarchistic in sentiment, were inspired by Béranger. Once more Espronceda has improved upon his models, "Les Gueux" and "Le Chant du Cosaque." Compare Espronceda's refrain in the "Cossack Song" with Béranger's in the work which suggested it:
¡Hurra, Cosacos del desierto! ¡Hurra!
La Europa os brinda espléndido botín