Juan Ruiz (ca. 1283 - ca. 1350), known as the Archpriest of Hita (Arcipreste de Hita), was a medieval Spanish poet. He is best known for his ribald, earthy poem, Libro de buen amor (The Book of Good Love). He was born either in Alcalá de Henares, or perhaps Alcalá la Real, a village of Jaén, then part of al-Andalus, or Muslim Spain. Little is known about him today, save that he was a cleric and probably studied in Toledo. Though his birth name is known to be Juan Ruiz, he is widely referred to by his title of "archpriest of Hita."

According to his own book, he was imprisoned for years, thought to be between 1337 to 1350, as punishment for some of his deeds (if the poem is any guide, they were quite inconsistent with his position as priest). However, the poem has long been considered as pseudo-autobiography. One of his poems states that he was imprisoned on the order of Gil Albornoz, archbishop of Toledo. In retaliation, he wrote Libro de Buen Amor (Book of Good Love), a massive, episodic work that chronicled much of medieval society through his eyes: ancient fables, ugly peasants, Ruiz's amorous dalliances with nuns, and what seems to be sincere religious fervor. The breadth of his scope, and the exuberance of his style have caused some to term him "the Spanish Chaucer."

Work

Speculation regarding whether or not the book was actually an autobiography is incessant. However, some believe that because one "relation" is written in third person (the story of Don Melón and Doña Endrina), that the whole poem is fictitious.

His language is characterized by its richness and its sermon-like tendency to repeat the same concept in several different ways. Noted for being very creative and alive, his work utilizes colloquial, popular vocabulary, including snippets of the Arabic widely spoken in the Spain of his time. At the same time, though, he shows a profound knowledge of human emotion and is able to strike a balance between gentleness and brazenness in his shrewd and frequently ironic writing.

It has been estimated that he died around 1350; by 1351, he no longer held the title of archpriest of Hita.

There are today three manuscripts of the Libro de Buen Amor. The Salamanca version, denoted S, resides in Madrid's Biblioteca Real and is considered the best of the three codices. The other two are the Academia Española version, known as Gayoso (G), and the Toledo (T) manuscript. The poem itself is 1,728 stanzas long and claims to be an autobiographical account of the author's love life. Through his lovers, we see a rich representation of medieval Spanish society.

External links

Bibliography

• Brownlee, Marina Scordilis. The Status of the Reading Subject in the Libro de buen amor. Chapel Hill: U.N.C. Dept. of Romance Languages : Distributed by University of North Carolina Press, 1985.
• Burkard, Richard W. The Archpriest of Hita and the Imitators of Ovid: A Study in the Ovidian Background of the Libro de buen amor. Newark, DE: Juan de la Cuesta, 1999.
• Dagenais, John. The Ethics of Reading in Manuscript Culture: Glossing the Libro de buen amor. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1994.
• Gybbon-Monypenny, G.B., ed. Libro de Buen Amor Studies. London: Támesis, 1970.
• Haywood, Louise M., and Louise O. Vasvári, eds. A Companion to the Libro de buen amor. Woodbridge, UK: Tamesis, 2004.
• Lecoy, Félix. Recherches sur le Libro de buen amor, de Juan Ruiz, Archiprêtre de Hita. Paris: E. Droz, 1938.
• Marmo, Vittorio. Dalle fonti alle forme: Studi sul Libro de buen amor. Naples: Liguori, 1983.
• Ruiz, Juan. El libro de buen amor. Edited by Alberto Blecua. Madrid: Cátedra, 1992.
• Vetterling, Mary-Anne. "A Bibliography for Juan Ruiz's Libro de buen amor." Continually updated. Click on: http://home.comcast.net/~vetterma
• Wacks, David. "Reading Jaume Roig's Spill and the Libro de buen amor in the Iberian maqâma tradition." Bulletin of Spanish Studies 83.5 (2006): 597-616.
• Zahareas, Anthony N. The Art of Juan Ruiz, Archpriest of Hita. Madrid: Estudios de Literatura Española, 1965.

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