Espejo del mito Algunas consideraciones sobre el epilio barroco

Abstract

The generic determination of the so-called epyllion, minor epic or mythological epic, depends not only on the understanding of its background in the equivocal baroque writing of myth, but also on the examination of its relation to the major epic. If we accept the definition of the epyllion as a by-product of the counter-reformation purification of the parent genre, we become aware of this process as a way to literary modernity: with the ideological marginalization of pagan mythology from the heroic epic that took place in the counter-reformation era, a genre was born that presented itself as a multi-faceted and comprehensive mirror-of-myth and which exactly for that reason endowed Spanish baroque literature with its specific, modern character.

Keywords

• barroco
• epilio
• epopeya
• mitología
• modernidad