What is SATRA: meaning, characteristics and EXAMPLES

Surely more than once you have heard of a satirical text, that is, a type of text that uses the literary resource of satire to launch a critical message through humor and comedy. In a teacher we want to discover you what is satire, meaning, characteristics and examples so that you can better understand what type of resource we are facing and that, thus, you can clearly identify it. We started!

We start with the definition of satire so that you know well what type of resource we are facing. As we have already anticipated in the introduction, a satire is a resource and literary subgenre that employs a sarcastic tone to launch a critical message through humor. The aim of the satire is to make a mockery or criticize a social event, a person, a work of art, and so on.

But, in addition to using satire in literature, you can also use in informal language and go to this resource to make a mockery or criticism about someone or something in particular. However, the usual thing is that if we talk about satire, we do it from the literary point of view, since it became a

The intention of satire is to offer a point of view, a perspective moralizing; but, also, it may be that the satire is only intended for mockery and with a purely playful purpose. It is important to point out that, although satire was originally used for entertainment purposes, the truth is that has a deeper background, since it criticizes and attacks social classes or prominent personalities of the time.

Origin of satire

Now that we know what satire is, let's delve a little into its origins and, thus, we will understand where this literary subgenre so common in our culture comes from.

The origin of satire is found in the Ancient Greece, specifically, in the iambic poetry. In the 7th century BC some Greek poets began to use satire to launch a burlesque critique of the society of their time; some of the names of these ancient satirical poets are Aristophanes and Semónides of Amorgos. They created the precedent for this subgenre that, years later, was followed by other renowned Latin authors such as Horacio, Seneca or Marcial.

The expansion of the satirical genre went further and in the Middle Ages we find that, not It is only part of poetry, but satire is found in all literary genres as the novel, theater, rehearsals, stories, etc.

Today, satirical texts are still part of our cultural corpus and, therefore, literature abounds in a large number of writings that use the irony, sarcasm, ridicule, etc., to convey a message through laughter and good humor.

Image: Aki Frases

To finish knowing the meaning of satire and really understand what are the elements of this subgenre, Next we are going to offer you a concise review of everything that the texts written under this premise. The most outstanding characteristics of the satire are those that we indicate below:

• It can be written in prose or verse, depending solely on the author's choice.
• Employ the comedy to launch a critical message to a person, society, event, etc.
• In order to deliver your critical message, use literary resourceslike irony, exaggeration, parody, sarcasm, etc.
• Both the subject matter and the characters that appear they are realistic and easily recognizable by the recipient of the message
• There is always a background under satirical texts, since the authors who use this resource want to convey an idea, a thought, etc.
• Caricatured situations that enhance the humorous tone of the text, but are based on a real and close idea

Did you know that there are different types of satire? Depending on how it is written, satirical texts can be divided into four different typologies. Here we discover them:

1. Satire in verse. As its name suggests, this satire is written in verse and the theme it deals with is inspired by common day-to-day themes, everyday themes.
2. Menippean satire. It is satire that mixes prose and verse at the same time. The origin of this hybrid genus is found in ancient Rome, specifically, in the 1st century BC with Marco Terencio Varrón. Normally, this type of satire deals with more intellectual themes and attacks specific characters in the society of the moment.
3. Formal satire. It is a direct satire where the narrator addresses the audience in a concrete way, openly and without filters.
4. Informal satire. It is when the criticism is more hidden in a literary text and the mocked object is understood, but it is drawn in a more subtle way. This is the satire typical of the theatrical works in which the characters are the ones who, with the dialogues, create the satire.

We end this lesson by presenting different examples of satire that have appeared in European literary texts. As we have already commented, we are facing a classic and ancient resource, therefore, there is a huge amount of examples of satirical texts in our culture; however, we have made a selection by country so you can find the most obvious examples.

Examples of satire in Spain

In Spain there is a wide variety of examples of satire, however, we have selected those texts that are more obvious and that are classic.

Miguel de Cervantes is one of the great satirists of the Golden Age; he specialized in doing literary satire on works like "The Colloquium of the dogs"; we also have the novel The Lazarillo de Tormes as a clear example of this resource.

But the clear winners of Spanish satire are, without a doubt, Quevedo and Góngora for their more than well-known rivalry and for the large number of satirical poems that they published the one against the other, that of "Once upon a man with a glued nose" is already one of the most recognized of our letters.

Examples of satire in England

In English literature there are also many satirical texts, especially in the 18th century, a time that was baptized by experts as the "age of satire". Alexander Pope he was one of the most emblematic satirical authors of the time with his work The Dunciad.

Satire in France

In French literature we also find examples of satires that are very important in literary history. During medieval France, two great satirical novels written by Rabelais stood out: Gargantua Y Pantagruel. But is he Voltaire the greatest French satirical author, 18th century writer who wrote a large number of unforgettable satirical texts.

Examples of satire in Italy

And we end up talking about the satirical influence on Italian literature to talk about classic authors like Bocaccio who, in works like Decameron, managed to concoct a lofty, humorous and insightful tone. Nor can we fail to mention Pietro Aretino, who was baptized as "the scourge of princes" by his texts against the princes and the great personalities of his time.

Example of a satirical poem

Here we leave you a satirical poem by Quevedo and that it is one of the great samples of satire in our country; its titled To a nose and the objective of the mockery of him was, of course, Góngora.

Once upon a man stuck a nose,

once upon a superlative nose,

once upon a time there was a real nose and write,

Once upon a very bearded swordfish.

It was a badly faced sundial,

a pensive alight,

elephant face up,

Ovidio Nasón was more narrated.

Once upon a spur of a galley,

Egyptian pyramid,

the twelve Tribes of noses was.

Once upon a very infinite nose,

a lot of nose,

nose so fierce that on Anas's face it was a crime.

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