The Theme of Lovers Dying Holded and/or Kissing: From Johannes Secundus and Lope de Vega to Lorca and Neruda

Abstract

The Dutch poet Johannes Secundus Everaerts included a poem in his Basia (1541) that was imitated by Spanish and French poets of different times. The poem of Secundus has the peculiarity of presenting lovers embracing and / or kissing at the moment of death to arrive together to the hereafter converted into a single being (and lovers take as an example of their union both physical and spiritual the The yedra attached to the trunk of any tree). Lope de Vega was the author who imitated him more literally, but not the only one who exerted his influence on the later poets: Pierre Ronsard and Juan Meléndez Valdes, who were based on another poem of the Basia, became fundamental models of Federico García Lorca and Pablo Neruda. The great poet was also inspired by the death of Adonis in both the version of Bion and that of Ovid.