Facsimile Edition of Lorca's 'Sonnets of Dark Love' Revives Controversial Legacy

June 13, 2025
Facsimile Edition of Lorca's 'Sonnets of Dark Love' Revives Controversial Legacy
  • In June 2025, a Galician publisher released a facsimile edition of Federico García Lorca's 'Sonnets of Dark Love', which was originally published clandestinely in the autumn of 1983.

  • The initial release of the sonnets had a significant cultural impact during the transitional period of post-Franco Spain in the early 1980s.

  • This 1983 publication was initiated by an anonymous group of intellectuals who distributed copies to 250 experts and journalists, which ultimately led to Lorca's family publishing the poems in 1984.

  • The original booklet, printed in red ink, was intended to honor Lorca's legacy, which his family sought to protect due to the explicit content of the poems.

  • The sonnets express deeply homoerotic and anguished themes, reflecting Lorca's personal struggles before his murder during the Spanish Civil War.

  • Biographer Ian Gibson, one of the original recipients of the poems, emphasized their explicit nature regarding homosexual love, despite media reluctance to acknowledge this.

  • The facsimile edition includes quotes from notable poets Pablo Neruda and Vicente Aleixandre, who recalled Lorca reciting the sonnets with beauty and emotional depth.

  • Interestingly, Lorca's family chose to publish the sonnets in the right-wing ABC newspaper, which controversially avoided using the term 'homosexual' in its coverage.

  • Henrique Alvarellos, who oversaw the new edition, obtained a copy of the original booklet, now valued at around €5,000, and created a faithful reproduction that mirrors the original's paper and texture.

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