Abstract
The term "Hispanoamerican modernism" denotes the period of the turn of the 20th century, and it is valid not only for the Spanish speaking countries in Latin America (which gained the independence in the 19th century), but also for Spain. Modernism was more than an artistic movement, it was - in the words of the Spanish writer and critic Juan Ramón Jiménez - a whole epoch, the main feature of which was the effort to renovate the arts.
Modernist writers were fascinated by the French culture and for that reason they have been criticized as those who forgot their own, American reality. This point of view is very limited.
The Hispanoamerican history, its past, present and future were fundamental for them, and although in their novels and stories they usually sought after exotic spaces and times, in their essays they formulated basic and lasting ideas about Hispanoamerican countries and the continent and its problems and dangers.Hispanoamerican modernism prepared ground for the modern Hispanoamerican literature, which conquered the world in the 20th century.