Week 7: Art, Music, Film, Performance, Literature

One of the major events that took place during the Exposició Universal was the celebration of the Jocs Florals (often written "Jochs Florals" in the orthography of the time; literally, "Floral Games"), a poetry competition with its roots in the Occitan and Provençal troubadour tradition of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries but revived in 1859. The reëstablishment of the Jocs Florals was a key component of the renaixença, a movement of romantic revivalism of traditional Catalan culture, which was particularly important given the cultural repression of the central Spanish government at the time. The Jocs Florals were broadly supported by Barcelona's leading political and cultural figures, as well as by the rising bourgeois élite. By the end of the 1880s, however, the atavistic and archaizing spirit of the Jocs Florals was seen by many as contrary to the progressive, modernistic spirit that was gripping the city and the region, pushing it into a prosperous and industrially advanced twentieth century. The Jocs Florals stood for the eclectic culture of the region's past, driven by diverse influences, without a standardized spelling or linguistic norms; those at the vanguard of culture, looking forward, saw that phase as completed, and a new one of unified language and regional identity as the proper way forward. Nevertheless, the Jocs Florals were still celebrated for their importance to Catalan identity, and were a key component of the festivities of 1888.

The Jocs Florals at the 1888 Exposició Universal. Source: Solà, Joan. "Els Jocs Florals i el Congrés Pedagògic de 1888."

In 1888, two competitions of Jocs Florals were held. Traditionally the competition took place on the first Sunday in May, but the city's mayor pushed the official contest back to the 27th so it could take place at the exposition. Some of the more ardent nationalists including Valentí Almirall staged a separate competition on the first Sunday of the month at the Teatre Novetats, while the official contest, the thirtieth of the modern era, took place in the exposition's Palau de les Belles Arts on the 27th.

The winner of the "Gaia Festa" was Mossèn Collell, whose poem Sagramental was a patriotic anthem:

"People who deserve to be free,

if they don't give it to you, take it...

Catalans, the time has come

to shout as brothers:

drive them out! drive them out!

for the freed homelands." [1]

Poems such as this were accompanied by lectures and discussions promoting the Catalan language and its culture. This was certainly an act of defiance, or at the very least a strong assertion of independence, as the "queen" of the festivities, who presided, was the actual Queen Regent of Spain, Maria Cristina (this was another reason Almirall and others held their own separate Jocs Florals). [2] Nevertheless, the Jocs Florals supported Barcelona's and Catalonia's identity not just in their existence and tradition but in their controversial and defiant content, too.

[1] Collell, Mossèn. Sagramental. 1888. In Vidal, Mei M. and Aisa, Ferran, Camins utòpics: Barcelona 1868-1888 (Barcelona: Edicions de 1984, 2004). 203. Translation mine: "Poble que mereix ser lliure, / si no l'hi donen, s'ho pren... / Catalans, ja ha arribat l'hora / de cridar agermanats: / via fora, via fora / per les pàtries llibertats."

[2] Solà, Joan. "Els Jocs Florals i el Congrés Pedagògic de 1888." www.bcn.es. Accessed 30 Oct 2011.