Autobiography in the "Libro de buen amor" in the Light of Some Literary Comparisons

Abstract

“Creemos que en este punto es inutil la indagacion de origenes”. With these words Menendez y Pelayo dismissed all speculation concerning the sources of the autobiographical form of the Libro de buen amor {Obras completas, XVII, 302). Whether or not it was the effect of these words, no thorough investigation has in fact been made of possible literary sources. Inevitably, all critics dealing with the Libro de buen amor in a general way, such as compilers of manuals of literature, have had to discuss the significance of the “autobiographical” aspect of the work. But none have sought to do more than offer some explanation of it in the light of mediaeval psychology or didactic techniques. This is true even of those who have made special studies of the Libro, notably Leo Spitzer, Felix Lecoy and Maria Rosa Lida. These three critics approached the problem in different ways, and took different attitudes, but all were equally concerned to discredit the idea that there might be any genuine autobiography in the Libr...