Diálogo de la lengua

In Naples, the most Spanish of the Italian cities, under the government of Viceroy Don Pedro de Toledo, Juan de Valdés wrote an intelligent portrait of the Spanish language of his time that also became a portrait of that imperial Spain located outside of Spain. . The Diálogo de la lengua (1535) disguises, in the form of a conversation between four characters, a very sharp description of what Spanish was like in the 16th century, what ideological and aesthetic discussions the language aroused at that stage and what different types of characters, native speakers or learners of Spanish, could coexist in the court circles of Naples in that period. The work recreates how, in the early hours of any given afternoon, a colloquium begins in a place near the sea that continues until twilight; a sparkling dialogue, friendly in tone but not corseted.