NICASIO

ALVAREZ DE

See also:

• CIENFUEGOS (originally FERNANDINA DE JAGUA)
• NICASIO ALVAREZ DE CIENFUEGOS (1764–1809)

CIENFUEGOS (1764–1809)  , Spanish poet and publicist, was born at Madrid on the 14th of December 1764 . He studied with distinction at Salamanca, where he met the poet Melendez Valdes . His poems, published in 1778, immediately attracted attention . He was successively editor of the Gaceta and Mercurio, and was condemned to death for having published an article against Napoleon; on the petition of his friends, he was respited and deported to France; he died at Orthez early in the following year . His verses are modelled on those of Melendez Valdes; though not deficient in technique or passion, they are often disfigured by spurious sentimentality and by the flimsy philosophy of the age . Cienfuegos was blamed for an unsparing use of both archaisms and gallicisms . His plays, Pitaco, Zoraida, La Condesa de Castilla and Idomeneo, four tragedies on the pseudo-classic French model, and Las Hermanas generosas, a comedy, are deservedly forgotten .