Bohemian character in spanish literature of the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century

Bohemian Character in Spanish Literature of the End of the 19th Century and the Beginning of the 20th Century This BA paper analyses the representation of Spanish bohemian character in Bohemian Lights (1924) by Valle-Inclán and Illuminations in the Shadows (1910) by Alejandro Sawa. The analysis is based on the ideas of Manuel Aznar Soler, Allen W. Phillips and other authors’ works. The relation between bohemians and the society is determined by using the ideas of sociology of literature and the theory in the field of cultural production, introduced and explained by Pierre Bourdieu. The purpose of this paper is to analyse and describe the phenomenon of bohemianism (its origins and characteristics) and to explain the features of a bohemian character in the two mentioned literary works and in Spain of late 19th century and early 20th century in general. The analysis showed that the bohemian character of the 19th and 20th centuries was developed as an opposite agent against the movements and ideology of the upper-class, in order to propagate the ideas of living for an art, “art for art’s sake”. The analysis made by using the theory of Bourdieu also showed that the phenomenon of bohemianism was created and expressed as an opposite movement against the traditional art system. The representative bohemian character is created in both analysed works and it has the main common characteristics: ideas of rebellion, nonconformist and critical point of view against the society, as well as a consideration of being an upper part of the society, of having a clear mind. Both characters share a vision of art innovation, of living an intellectual life for art’s sake while the society tends to reject the members of bohemian way of life due to their extravagance, opposition and cultural novelties