A Dictionary of Symbols

The unvarying essential meanings of around 1,000 symbols and symbolic themes commonly found in the art, literature and thought of all cultures through the ages are clarified.

(Forward)

IN THE INTRODUCTION to this volume Señor Cirlot shows his wide and learned conception of the subject-matter of this dictionary, and the only task left to me is to present the author himself, who has been familiar to me for some years as the leading protagonist of a very vital group of painters and poets in Barcelona. Juan Eduardo Cirlot was born in Barcelona in 1916, and after matriculating from the College of the Jesuits there, studied music. From 1943 onwards he was active as a poet, and published four volumes of verse between 1946 and 1953. Meanwhile the group of painters and poets already mentioned had been fo rmed (Dau al Set), and Cirlot became its leading theoretician. For historical or political reasons, Spain had been slow to develop a contemporary movement in the arts comparable to those in other European countries; its greatest artists, Picasso and Miró, had identified themselves with the School of Paris. But now a vigorous and independent ‘School of Barcelona’ was to emerge, with Antonio Tapies and Modesto Cuixart as its outstanding representatives. In a series of books and brochures Cirlot not only presented the individual artists of this group, but also instructed the Spanish public in the history and theoretical foundations of the modern movement as a whole.