Characteristics of the literary VANGUARD in EUROPE and LATIN AMERICA

In the middle of the 20th century arose the literary vanguards, an artistic trend that not only affected the world of literature, but also spread to all artistic disciplines: painting, sculpture, cinema, photography... It was a groundbreaking current that was committed to breaking with old ways and discovering a new way of making and understanding art.

In a teacher we are going to discover what the main characteristics of the literary avant-garde so that, thus, you can know the most distinctive elements of this current baptized as "the isms" and in the that include movements as surprising and original as Surrealism, Dadaism, Expressionism, etc. Read on and discover one of the most amazing movements in the world of art and literature!

Before listing the characteristics of the literary avant-garde it is important that we better understand the definition of this artistic trend and, thus, we will be able to understand its essence.

The literary avant-gardes of the 20th century They were different artistic movements that sought to break with the past and find new forms with maximum freedom of expression. It affected all artistic disciplines, but in literature it had a great incidence and avant-garde authors who stood out a lot and became true revolutionaries.

There were many avant-garde movements Among which we highlight surrealism, expressionism, futurism, etcetera; but, although they were different movements, the truth is that they shared elements in common: they had a political and artistic commitment. And, precisely because of these similarities, historically all these currents have been included under the name of "artistic vanguards".

In fact, in the very etymology of the term we find the revolutionary and transgressive character of this trend: Vanguard comes from the french word avant-garde, a term rescued from the military field and that refers to the need to move forward no matter what.

Characteristics of the literary avant-garde

We are going to discover what are the characteristics of the literary avant-garde in order to understand the common elements that all the artistic currents have that swelled this important and groundbreaking movement. And it is that, although the literary surrealism and the futurism They are different aesthetics, they share the same ideology and the same claims. Here we tell you!

• Search for maximum freedom. Avant-garde authors wanted art to comply with the maxim of creative freedom. For this reason, many times these avant-garde works were experiments that the artists themselves carried out to try to shed your own limits and explore the creativity and possibilities that art brings to being human. A clear example of this is the automatic writing so defended by the surreal authors.
• Creation of new realities. The avant-garde did not want to imitate reality or for the work of art to be a reflection of it; what they wanted was to create a new reality, more consonant with their time, with their spirit and with their progressive mentality.
• Linguistic experimentation. One of the most outstanding characteristics of the literary avant-garde is that the authors broke with the norms and logic of language to explore other realities. And, therefore, they opted to use word games, create new literary devices, play with images, rhyme, punctuation marks, etc. Creative freedom was applied in the same language and avant-garde works are totally original and unique.
• Break with the past. The character of the avant-garde was to create a new art that was fully aligned with the new world that had emerged in the 20th century. Therefore, they wanted to break all ties with previous movements such as realism, naturalism and late romanticism.
• Politicized movement. It is very important to note that the vast majority of avant-garde artists were politicized and shared many ideas. They were mostly left-wing, revolutionary or Marxist; in fact, André Breton, the founder of the Surrealist manifestoHe lost many followers of his current due to his increasingly extreme political ties.
• Break with linear narration. We continue with the characteristics of the literary avant-garde to talk about another element of the authors. And it is that freedom was not only sought in the topics covered, the approach or the language used, but also experimented with the same narrative. It is common to find literary texts in which there are temporal jumps, narration in different planes or in simultaneous planes.
• Bet on a depersonification of art. They wanted to create works of art that were generalized and less personalized. For this reason, it is common to find more abstract pieces where the "creative self" is relegated to the background.
• Symbolist art. And finally, within the literary avant-garde there is also a key element that tells us that it is repeated in all "isms"; and it is that art began to be symbolist, objects had great importance for their abstraction and for their multiple meanings without the need to use words.

We leave you a video from one of our teachers so that you can learn more about the avant-garde movement of the 20th century.

The avant-garde movement affected everyone. At first, it expanded in Europe, but over time it also came to other continents like the American one. Therefore, below we want to explain what were the characteristics of the literary avant-garde in Latin America, since the movement took on a new and totally unique air.

As in Europe, in Latin America the avant-garde appeared with a desire for artistic renewal, a break with past traditions and a search for new forms of literary and artistic expression in general. But in this area of ​​the world, the avant-garde had a profound meaning: and it is that the authors also they sought to create their own identity, stop imitating or being influenced by European art and delve into its roots to search for an authentic and indigenous voice.

To do this, the artists began to investigate and divest themselves of the implanted European heritage. A movement that was the basis for creating unique movements such as the magical realism, an aesthetic originating in Latin America and with a strong presence of its folklore and traditions.

The characteristics of avant-garde literature in Latin America are the following:

• Anti-modernist movement. Let us remember that in Latin America, Modernism had a name and surname: Ruben Dario. For this reason, the avant-garde artists wanted to break with the perfect forms of the modernist father and bet on a more revolutionary, more politicized and more progressive art.
• Search of own identity. This is one of the most prominent and identifying characteristics of the literary avant-garde in Latin America. And, unlike in Europe, in the American continent, the avant-gardes were a unique opportunity to seek their own identity and renew their lyrics. In this sense, it should be noted that poetry was the genre most used by the authors.
• European narrative techniques. In order to break with the preceding artistic legacy, Latin American authors followed the influence of Europe and, therefore, This, they used breaking techniques such as, for example, multiple narration, free verse, the use of calligrams, collage, etc.
• Report of social injustices. We have already commented that one of the characteristics of the literary avant-garde is that it has a fairly important ideological sense. In Latin America this was even clearer and the authors used their texts to denounce injustices, inequalities, poverty, etc.
• Own avant-garde currents. And, finally, a characteristic of the avant-garde in Latin America is that, in addition to the European movements, the authors created two own and unique currents in the territory: creationismand the ultraism.

Vanguard currents in Latin America

Now that we know the characteristics of the literary avant-garde in Latin America, we are going to talk about one of the most interesting contributions in the field of literature: the creation of two "isms" of their own, creationism and ultraism. Here we tell you!

• Creationism. Vicente Huidobro he was the father of this avant-garde Latin American current. And, as his name suggests, the author defends that the author must become a creator of new worlds, of new realities that are created with words. Huidobro created a large number of neologisms, used punctuation marks freely, etc. It was his own world.
• Ultraism. This movement appeared from the hand of Jorge Luis Borges and it consists of a type of art based on metaphor, but an incoherent metaphor that serves to explain the poet's mind. The language is more crude and simple because it is only used to express the ideas of the author.
• Other "isms". Although these two were the most notorious and important for the history of literature, you should know that in Latin America other "isms" were also created, such as simplism, stridentism or nothingness.

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If you want to read more articles similar to Characteristics of the literary avant-garde, we recommend that you enter our category of History of Literature.

• González, L. F., & Molano, L. TO. (2005). The transience of the Latin American avant-garde: a critical essay on Oliverio Girondo. Diversitas: Perspectives in Psychology, 1 (1), 96-108.
• Soní Soto, A. (2007). César Vallejo and the literary avant-garde. Arguments (Mexico, DF), 20 (55), 185-207.
• Verani, H. J. (1993). The Latin American avant-gardes. New Critical Text, 6 (1), 262-263.