The Generation of '98 (also called Generation of 1898 or, in Spanish, Generación del 98 or Generación de 1898) was a group of novelists, poets, essayists, and philosophers active in Spain at the time of the Spanish-American War (1898).
The name Generación del 98 was coined by Jose Martínez Ruiz, commonly known as Azorín, in his 1913 essays titled “La generación de 1898,” alluding to the moral, political, and social crisis in Spain produced by the disaster and the loss of the colonies of Cuba, Puerto Rico and the Philippines after defeat in the Spanish-American War that same year. In his work Spain, 1808-1939, Raymond Carr defines the Generation of ’98 as the “group of creative writers who were born in the seventies, whose major works fall in the two decades after 1898.”
The intellectuals included in this group are known for their criticism of the Spanish literary and educational establishments, which they saw as having characteristics of conformism and ignorance, and a lack of any true spirit. Their criticism was coupled with, and heavily connected to, the group’s dislike for the Restoration Movement that was occurring in Spanish government.
Read more about Generation Of '98: Historical Context, A Movement of Criticism and Ideals, Key Figures, Works Referenced
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—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
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—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)