is not only consequence of the French symbolism of the Eighties; even if coming from there in the initial impulse, and although the vocabulary and the subject matter of the Modernists was impregnated by those of the French symbolists, the Spanish Modernists did not take much time in assimilating also the symbolism of the poets of English language, and still the one of San Juan the de la Cruz as well. It cannot surprise that in the general current of Modernism diverse tendencies come together, some times complementary, some times contradictory, because thus it has to be, fundamentally, any historical period, be the Renaissance, the Romanticism, or the Modernism. And those diversities and antagonisms occur inside men, and not only between men. Divided, in struggle with the others and with themselves, denying with the reason what the feeling postulates, the top figures of the Modernism, who better represented it (Rubén Darío or Miguel de Unamuno) lived in anguish, if not in desperation. These two feelings, much more than the swans and the princesses, mere occasional ornamentation, constitute the most arduous legacy of the Modernists to their heirs and successors. Some authors Miguel de Unamuno Miguel de Unamuno (1864–1936) was an essayist, novelist, poet, playwright and philosopher from Spain. In his works he cultivated a great variety of literary genres. Rubén Darío Félix Rubén García Sarmiento (1867–1916) was a Nicaraguan poet who wrote under the pseudonym of Rubén Darío. His poetry brought vigor to the stale, monotonous Spanish-language poetry of the time. Bibliography Modernismo (Literatura), Enciclopedia Salvat Universal, Salvat Editores, . Silva, José Asunción, Obra completa, Madrid: Ediciones de Centenario. Allca xx, Silva Poetry House, 1996. See also Literature of Spain: evolution of the Spanish literature. Modernism: the movement in general. Spanish and Italian Modernist Studies Forum at the Pennsylvania State University Spanish literature