During this period, the artists Diego Velázquez and El Greco flourished. Tomás Luis de Victoria, Cristóbal de Morales, Francisco Guerrero, Luis de Milán, and Alonso Lobo advanced Renaissance music. Nor was the flowering confined to the visual arts and music. Spanish literature also thrived. Miguel de Cervantes, born north of Madrid, created Don Quixote. And Spain’s celebrated playwright Lope de Vega wrote a thousand plays abounding with stylistic innovations. He was so prolific that Cervantes called him Monstruo de la Naturaleza, the Monster of Nature.
