‘Que la beldad es vuestra, la voz mía’: A Cognitive Pragmatic Answer to a Gongorine Crux

Abstract

‘Oro no rayó así flamante grana’ (1623), the last love sonnet by Luis de Góngora, has eluded the full comprehension of its critics since the seventeenth century due to its thematic ambiguity and formal obscurity. This article examines its critical reception with the tools afforded by François Recanati’s cognitive pragmatics to analyse how each critic has pragmatically responded to the sonnet’s interpretive cruxes. From this vantage point, it is hypothesised how it can also be read as an autobiographical and metaliterary statement. The results suggest that this sonnet might be three poems in one, functioning as a metaliterary emblem for the history of Petrarchism up to Góngora.