What happened on this day?

11th July is the most special day in the calendar A date in which literature played a very important role. And not precisely because it has published masterpieces, but because, throughout history, Authors and poets Which, in one way or another, holds great significance in contemporary thought and culture.

For example, do you remember the two poets who spent part of the Baroque period sending each other poisonous poems? One of them, Luis de Góngora (the other was Francisco de Quevedo), was born on this day, but in the year 1561. Dedicated to both poetry and drama, he soon became the greatest exponent of a movement called Communalism or GongorismWhich greatly influenced the literature of later authors such as Federico García Lorca or Rafael Alberti.

But long ago, in year 1006On July 11 there was already an important event for this discipline in his memory: on that date, Rodrigo Díaz de Vivar, better known as El Cid, died. He starred in one of the most important epics of Spanish literature, mio sid songWhich is preserved in the National Library of Spain, 10 centuries later, without any author.

And, why not: today we also celebrate the first anniversary of the death of Milan Kundera, author of 14 novels in which he was able to portray the dilemmas and contradictions of human existence. Your own experience is inside you Original Czech Republic upset This allowed him to adopt a philosophical, political and historical perspective in his books, which were often closer to essays than novels. One of them, considered his masterpiece ‘The Unbearable Lightness of Being’ (1984).