ECHOES, WAVES AND MIRRORS
(Góngora's universe reversed)
LA SOLEDAD PRIMERA, 669 -76
La gaita al baile solicita el gusto,
a la voz el salterio;
cruza el Trión más fijo el hemisferio,
y el tronco mayor danza en la ribera;
el eco, voz ya entera, (1)
no hay silencio a que pronto no responda;
fanal es del arroyo cada onda, (2)
luz el reflejo, la agua vidrïera.
Trión refers to Polaris, the most stable star of the Oso Minor, represented on earth by the semaphors which surround an Oso Mayor down by the river, activated by the light of Trión (in space) to perform a dance during a wedding (on earth). The entire hemisphere is stabalised around Trión (a fixed cross in the Oso Minor constellation), while on earth the Big Bear moves through light, semaphors and glass. Here Góngora plays with super natural powers: the lights of two starsigns combatting each other in and around a creek. The comma which succeeds Trión is significant; the text could also be read as: "cruza el Trión (más fijo el hemisferio)" or: "el Trión más fijo cruza (4) el hemisferio".
Why la agua vidrïera? Answer: don Luis wanted the verse to rhyme with entera, and avoid a Greek accusative. The glass enables, the semaphors guide, the light delivers.
The verse may be read as: luz el reflejo, la vidrïera agua. Or: luz el reflejo, el agua vidrïero. Or: luz el reflejo, vidrïera el agua.
Don Luis took the best option. A monotonous repetition of el would not have been right: el eco, el arroyo, el reflejo, el agua, el vidriero. He did not even reiterate la voz, but chose ya to maintain the ever present "a" in this fragment.(3)
Don Luis took the best option. A monotonous repetition of el would not have been right: el eco, el arroyo, el reflejo, el agua, el vidriero. He did not even reiterate la voz, but chose ya to maintain the ever present "a" in this fragment.(3)
The event is surrounded by the shapes and sounds of nature (with some mysticism) impregnated by the music of Northern Spain, composed by the poet in the satisfying scale of A Major.(4)
1) Góngora should have written "en" here, but instead wrote down (by candle light) a comma. The same occurs a few lines later.
Quite a dominant voice (double / two-way): the echo. Even with the sounds produced by the gaita and psalterio completely gone the echo still produces this music perfectly. Without the music the eco would not have existed at all: only reiterated silence.
"No" appears twice: a complex echo which neutrolizes every silence.
Góngora could have written "always" here, but wrote no ... no instead, in order to terminate responder in "a". This "no ... no" construction is difficult to imagine let alone translate. It derives from the Greek literature: here repetition creates contradiction.
2) Alonso, in his interpretation (1927), states: el agua de vidriera. Carreira (Antología Poética, 2009) writes: el verso 676 es quiásmico. Pellicer interpretes Góngora's visualization of the creek in detail.
Initially Góngora wrote a cada onda in line 675. (See text below).
3) & 4) In the Dedication Góngora played with the a, u, o and e.
(4) The verb "cruzar" should not be translated as "to surf".
(*) Jammes published in 1984 (in Criticón no. 27, University Le Mirail, Toulouse) a handwritten copy of a Góngora manuscript (dated 17th century) obtained by Prof. Antonio Rodriguez-Moñino. It contains 779 lines of the first Soledad, in a very early construction. Góngora's early texts often contain spelling errors. (Here: "frio", "fijo", the comma in line 671). Trión is the North Star Polaris, the most stable one of the "Oso Minor". After that Góngora writes "más frío, el emisferio" (the cold spotlight of Trión) in combination with a "tronco maior" mirrored by the moving lighthouses of a creek. Góngora might have read the studies of Ptolomeo, and study the stars while staying overnight in the fields of Spain. "Trión" refers to: evening, night. "Gaita", "psalterio": Galicia.
Of course the "Rodríguez Manuscript" is an early version of the first Solitude, and Góngora might have altered the text later on. (In the text below he leaves out "gaita". "Emisferio" features in order to rhyme with "psalterio" to musically describe the wedding. After that the visual part emerges). We could translate "mas" (in line 671) as but, and interprete the line as: from a cold hemisphere the star (the handle of the "Oso Minor" (in the shape of a ladle) descends to the warmer ambience of the creek.
* Trión also refers to an Italian card game.
* Fanal derives from the Greek phanárion.
* The Soledades mainly originate from the Greek language, translated by Valencia to Latin, by Góngora to old Spanish and by us to modern Spanish.
N.B. It would take 10 - 15 years to interpret Las Soledades while consulting the texts of Alonso, Jammes, Salcedo Coronel, Pellicer, Carreira, Roses, Diego, Guillén, Alberti, Lorca, Jones, Pabst, Orozco, Arroyo, Séneca, Mena, Foulché-Delbosc, McGow, Millé, Spitzer, Rodríguez-Moñino, Malkiel, Valencia, Crysostom.
Góngora's Soledades will be read in Spanish, accompanied by up-to-date,(1) academic interpretations. Understanding the texts written by the genius from Córdoba will take time, but the persistent reader will be awarded with text of incredible beauty, written by one of Spain's most prominent poets.
(1). The interpretations published in the 1600s by Pellicer and Salcedo Coronel are very useful indeed. However, since the revival of Góngora's poetry in the late 1800s more scholars have ventilated their interpretations and opinions, to be read by us. What students will ask Annum 2026: "Where do I get my information/books from? Where can I study?" (To get started: Visit the website of the University of Córdoba. Wikipedia. Internet bookstores. Etc.) (Góngora's books are not widely available in shops outside Andalucía. I found one in the bookshop behind the Corte Inglés in Bilbao, near Abando). A translation provides the story, but not the lyrical aspects nor the conceptual contents of the poetry.
Federico García Lorca stated in the 1920s: "Góngora will not be understood in one reading".
This website: gongora.blospot.com was occupied earlier on. When it became available I decided to do the best I can to present the most uptodate information possible. People from around the world visit this site now! I do not want to discourage anyone, but your knowledge will come one day at the time. It will take time.