The sonnet in Spanish in Latin American and Philippine Modernismos: Shared and local features in content and form in two related but distinct traditions

Modernista Philippine poetry in Spanish has been misanalyzed in the critical literature. Among other problems, Retana (1909, 19) presents Filipino authors as unoriginal imitators of prominent and Latin American Modernists like Darío or Santos Chocano. More recently, Bautista (2008) equates Philippine with Latin American Modernism, reporting that both traditions are inspired by a Far-East exoticism and escapism (in the case of Latin American Modernism, such a source of inspiration had already been proposed in earlier literature, like Henriquez Ureña, 1954, 20).

Yet both traditions are distinct, as we argue in the context of the DigiPhiLit project, which involves a historical reassessment of Philippine literature in Spanish, aided by digital tools. In this work, we present a systematic comparison between Latin American and Philippine modernista sonnets in Spanish, towards an evaluation of the influence of Latin American material on Philippine texts.

Latin American Modernism introduced numerous innovations in the sonnet form in Spanish, adding metrical and structural diversity besides untraditional rhyme schemes. Such innovations are also cultivated by Filipino authors in original manners. However, it is at the content level that both traditions really diverge, and the claim that Filipino authors show a penchant for Far-East exoticism as a means for escapism needs to be revised.