Bécquer: Leyendas y Rimas (Obras escogidas: Leyendas y Rimas) for Spanish learners: level, words and how to read it

What the book is about

The Leyendas are twelve tales set mostly in medieval Spain, in Toledo, Soria and Seville. In “El monte de las ánimas” a girl asks her cousin to fetch a ribbon from a haunted mountain on the night of the dead. In “Los ojos verdes” a young hunter follows a woman with green eyes into a lake. In “Maese Pérez el organista” a dead organist returns to play at Christmas Mass.

The book also includes “Desde mi celda”, letters Bécquer wrote from a monastery in the mountains of Aragon, and the Rimas, short poems about love, poetry and loss, such as “¿Qué es poesía?… Poesía… eres tú” and “Volverán las oscuras golondrinas”.

Themes

• The supernatural. Ghosts, spirits and curses, told as old local traditions.
• Ideal love. Bécquer’s heroes chase a perfect woman who may not exist.
• Poetry and the inexpressible. The Rimas keep asking how to put feelings into words.
• Medieval Spain. Castles, monasteries, knights and the narrow streets of old towns.

How hard is Bécquer: Leyendas y Rimas to read in Spanish?

How many unknown words will you meet? With a vocabulary of about 2,000 words, roughly 21 in every hundred, since those words cover 79.5% of the text. With 5,000 words it is about 13 in a hundred, with 10,000 about 9. Character names are not counted.

Measured by vocabulary alone, the book is C1: that is the level at which almost every word is already familiar (why 98% matters). Tap-to-translate covers the rest, so you can start at B2. It is slightly harder than Ratón Pérez and slightly easier than Fábulas de Samaniego.

What is hard: Romantic literary vocabulary (tinieblas, trémulo, lontananza, derredor), medieval words (almena, mosén), the inverted word order of poetry and the old spelling of this edition, which writes á for the preposition a. What helps: each legend is a short story of 2,000 to 5,000 words with a clear, spooky plot, and many Rimas are only four lines long.

Our take: B2 with tap-to-translate (C1 by vocabulary). Start with a legend, keep the Rimas for when you want something short and beautiful.

Words to know before you start

The book’s own vocabulary: frequent in this text, much less common elsewhere. Ten minutes with this list makes the opening chapters smoother.

How to read it in the original

1. Start with “El monte de las ánimas” or “Los ojos verdes”. They are short, famous and easy to follow.
2. Read the Rimas aloud. They are short and musical; reading them aloud helps you feel the rhythm and the word order.
3. Ignore the accent on á. In this old spelling á is just the preposition a.
4. One legend per evening. About half an hour each.

The first line

En Sevilla, en el mismo atrio de Santa Inés, y mientras esperaba que comenzase la Misa del Gallo, oí esta tradición á una demandadera del convento.

Gustavo Adolfo Bécquer, Obras escogidas: Leyendas y Rimas

atriochurch porch

noun

Tap a highlighted word

“In Seville, in the very porch of Santa Inés, while I was waiting for Midnight Mass to begin, I heard this tradition from a lay sister of the convent.” The opening of the first legend, “Maese Pérez el organista”. Bécquer presents his stories as traditions heard from ordinary people, and Misa del Gallo is the Spanish name for Christmas Midnight Mass.

Frequently asked questions