After a distant age of glorious literary culture, whose heyday was in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, the Catalan language fell into disuse due mainly to the strength of the English, which was naturally adopted by the Catalan culture and its language . The language was not lost, it continued to be used by the majority of Catalans, especially in rural areas, but the use of writing, especially literary, almost disappeared. Four centuries later, in mid-nineteenth century, coinciding with the rediscovery of Europe's other regional languages \u200b\u200bfall into oblivion because of the prestige of the languages \u200b\u200bof national roll Catalan, initially called Limousin by all, experienced a spectacular rebirth that would take many years to bear fruit extraordinary hand of a galaxy of literary adventure set out to re-write in the language of Desclot and Muntaner.
One of the main architects of the Renaissance, known universally by the term Catalan Renaissance, was the historian, essayist and poet Barcelona Joaquim Rubio i Ors, born July 31, 1818. He studied philosophy and theology in his hometown, where he later obtained a doctorate in law after leaving their original ecclesiastical vocation.
Following the publication in 1833 of the Ode to asylee Homeland Aribau, no other writer had dared to break the taboo that the Catalan language was not suitable for the cultivation of literature. That had been the view of famous Catalan artists of previous generations, as Capmany (who had declared "dead language for the republic of letters"), and his own days as Milà i Fontanals, and the same Aribau Piferrer.
But in 1839 began to appear monthly in the Journal of Barcelona a few poems Rubio i Ors, signed with the pseudonym The Llobregat Gaytan, which would be collected in book two years later. In his foreword Rubio complained of being alone, that no consider a contemporary author of Catalan as a literary language and championed its cultivation in a bilingual region used for such purposes only English.
The appearance of these poems caused much controversy and many troubles to the author because the vast majority of his countrymen ridiculed the claim of using a language that literally considered outdated and can only be used for family relationships, especially among the lower classes and rural . Rubio had expected, since in the prologue and warned that "the sembler molts an extravagance, a ridícol anacronisme" ("many will seem an extravagance, a ridiculous anachronism "), while grieved that his countrymen" are avergonyeixen that the sorprengue parlant en català, com a criminal caught in the acte qui "(" shame of being caught speaking in Catalan, as whom a criminal caught in the act ").
More than half a century later, well into the twentieth century, the creator of Catalan nationalism Enric Prat de la Riba, lamented that "poor families considered an insult, an insult, that they write letters in Catalan" .
Rubio's son, Antonio Rubio y Lluch, during a speech in memory of his father at the Royal Academy Letters of Barcelona in February 1912, explained the attitude of one's contemporaries:
"(...) illustrate an entire generation who loved the language of Castile with veneration and enthusiasm, which put extreme care not to fall into the Catalan lower, or turn to avoid a little castizo, who did not understand national literary language other than English or Catalan poetry conceived but as a conventional language, a sort of Provencal or Limousin, far removed from common speech. "
However, others were soon to follow in the footsteps of Rubio, including the hitherto reluctant Milà i Fontanals and Mariano Aguilo, Bofarull and Victor Antonio Balaguer.
This momentum would eventually causing the restoration of the Floral Games of Barcelona in 1859.
Although rarely remembered today, Rubio has also written many poems in Castilian, as entitled to my country celebrating the recent war in Morocco:
"So when the African
yesterday tried to sully our banners , saw himself at
the shadow of the English banner
Catalans fight like lions "
In his maturity, Rubio wrote a long poem dedicated to Spain's fight against Islam, De Covadonga to Granada. These are the last lines:
"Oh! glory, Spain, to you. You went the wall
do horrendous waves crashed
that break the Pyrenees fence
had exchanged their future
wild a servant of Mohammed
Europe that Rome had
to break the yoke hard.
Oh! if ... if the cross shines on Europe, and not moan
in infamous bondage;
if your cervix does not dull your knife, and its plant
no rust stain
of crickets, a tyrant monster
African soil, after God, oh beloved country,
Debelo the people of the lightning war, and your monarchs
heroes who, in Granada,
the crusader banner that
Pelayo Covadonga at the foot of received,
in the air triumphantly gave Alhambra "And in another
Instead he sang to the union of kingdoms that succeeded the English unit after the fragmentation caused by the Muslim invasion:
"Poets of Castile, where it was once just
between our parents were now ay! peace,
floor and was burning Spain arena of struggle
the haughty Castilian and Catalan bold
deposed complaints, united banners,
tower bar and forming a shield, the former enemies
trocáronse
brothers because uniéronse in Castilla y Aragón "
In recognition of his merits the Government's Office was awarded the Grand Cross Isabel la Católica.
On March 29, 1899 he was appointed rector of the University of Barcelona, \u200b\u200ba position he only had a week as died in his hometown on April 7.
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