SOURCE: Wilcox, John C. “Rosalía de Castro.” In Women Poets of Spain, 1860-1990: Toward a Gynocentric Vision, pp. 44-83. Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1997.

In the following essay, Wilcox discusses the context of political, social, and esthetic marginalization within which Castro's poetry was written.

Unlike her sisters, Rosalía de Castro has established a secure reputation in Peninsular literature, but such was not the case during her lifetime (1837-85), when she fluctuated between being a “Nobody” (Emily Dickinson's word) and a “santiña” (dear little saint).¹ Few have noted her “monstrous” qualities, to use Gilbert and Gubar's metaphor for a committed woman artist whose subconscious mind is intent on self-determination; but it is the “monstrous” as opposed to “angelic” persona that interests today's students of poetry. Rosalía's “monster” persona can be glimpsed if her poems are read as texts that were generated by a writing subject...