Jorge de Montemor
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Jorge de Montemor (Spanish: Jorge de Montemayor) (1520? – 26 February 1561) was a Portuguese novelist and poet, who wrote almost exclusively in Spanish. His most famous work is a pastoral prose romance, the Diana (1559).
Biography
He was born at Montemor-o-Velho (near Coimbra), whence he derived his name, the Spanish form of which is Montemayor.
He seems to have studied music in his youth, and to have gone to Spain in 1543 as
His reputation is based on a prose work, the
It is important as the first pastoral novel published in Spain; as the starting-point of a widespread literary fashion; and as the indirect source, through the translation included in Googe's Eglogs, epytaphes and sonnets (1563), of an episode in The Two Gentlemen of Verona. Though Portuguese was Montemor's native language, he only used it for two songs and a short prose passage in the sixth book of the Diana. His mastery of Spanish is amazing, and even Miguel de Cervantes, who judges the verses in the Diana with unaccustomed severity, recognizes the remarkable merit of Montemor's prose style. That he pleased his own generation is proved by the seventeen editions and two continuations of the Diana published in the 16th century, by parodies, imitations and renderings in French and English.
References
- public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Montemayor, Jorge". Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 18 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 766. This article incorporates text from a publication now in the
Further reading
Mueller, RoseAnna M. (1989), "Introduction", The Diana, Lampeter, Dyfed, Wales: Edwin Mellen, pp. 1–45