Co-translated, with Dr. Robert Rudder, Luis Vélez
de Guevara’s novel El Diablo cojuelo for
a bilingual, annotated edition (Stockcero, 2018)
Robert Rudder and Ignacio López-Calvo
For a printed version, click here
Introduction
In
1641, the Spanish playwright, poet and novelist Luis Vélez de Guevara (born Luis Vélez
de Santander) published the fantastical novel El diablo cojuelo (The Limping Devil), .
Although most Spanish literary masterpieces (Don Quixote, The Trickster of
Seville, and the Song of My Cid)
have been translated into English a number of times, this work, admired by
Cervantes,[1]
Lope de Vega and others, has remained unavailable in English translation, Vélez
de Guevara, who was a Jewish converso (convert),
was born to a well-to-do family in the town of Écija, Seville, in either 1578
or 1579. He studied art at the University of Osuna, graduating in 1596. George
Peale sees converso allusions in The Limping Devil and Gareth A. Davis
also points out that “in his plays Vélez sometimes casts his gracioso[2]
in a converso guise. The purpose was humorous, but the humour can
only have obtained a full response from that portion of the audience which was
aware of Vélez’s social origins” (25).
Vélez
de Guevara served as a page to Rodrigo de Castro, the Archbishop of Seville,
for four years, and then traveled as a soldier to Italy and Algiers. After living for a brief period of time in Valladolid,
where King Felipe III’s (1598-1621)new court was located, he
established himself in the Court in Madrid in 1607 at the service of the Count
of Saldaña (Diego Gómez de Sandoval y Rojas; 1551-1608), changing his name at
this time from Luis Vélez de Santander to “de Guevara,” an attempt perhaps to
conceal his Jewish lineage (a certain Luis de Santander was executed, as a Jew,
in Écija in 1554). During this time, as his literary reputation grew, Vélez de
Guevara wrote laudatory poetry and drama although he lived in constant debt.
After leaving the service of the Count of Saldaña, his financial problems
increased (he had a large family, having married
three times, a possible cause of his poverty). In 1625, he entered the
service of the Marquis of Peñafiel, and subsequently became an usher of the
chamber of King Felipe IV.
During
his lifetime, he was highly celebrated by his literary peers; although his fame
as a writer increased with his participation in literary academies and poetry
contests, his poor economic situation remained the same. He died on November
10, 1644, having penned more than 400 dramas, 103 of which exist today (eight of his comedies were written in collaboration with
other playwrights), along with the work by which he is best known: El diablo cojuelo.
Among
the many plays he wrote, some of the best known historical dramas are Reinar después de morir (To Reign after Death, 1652); La luna de la sierra (Mountain Moon); El diablo
está en Cantillana (The Devil
Is in Cantillana, 1622); Más pesa el rey que la
sangre (The King Outweighs Bloodline, 1621-1622); La serrana de la
Vera (The Mountain Girl from La Vera, 1603); and A lo que obliga el ser rey (A
King’s Obligations, 1625).
He also wrote religious plays such as
La Magdalena (The Magdalene)
and La hermosura de Raquel (Rachel’s
Beauty; Part I [1602-1605] and
Part II [1602-1608]), as well as autos
sacramentales (one-act allegorical religious plays) like La abadesa del cielo (The Abbess from Heaven; 1700), El nacimiento de Cristo (The Birth of Christ), and La mesa redonda (The Round Table), as well as the
interlude (entremés) La burla más
sazonada (The Most Seasoned
Mockery).[3] As Germán Vega García-Luengos points out, even though Vélez de Guevara is
mostly remembered for his surviving prose work, he deserves a place in Spanish
Baroque literary history primarily because of his plays, if we consider the
number he wrote and how his contemporaries described his opus (n.p.). Footnote,
citing García-Luengos page number? Indeed, Maria Grazia Profeti agrees by
emphasizing that “Luis Vélez’s works were most successful in his
time, unquestionably so
Perhaps part of this impressive
accomplishment is because, like Lope de Vega, Vélez de Guevara seems to have
tried to provide his audiences with the type of product they expected. Vega García-Luengos thus
maintains that the peculiarities of Vélez de Guevara’s writing must be
interpreted in light of his patrons’ preferences: “a theatrical opus not only modeled by his personal
genius, but also shaped by his patrons’ preferences. Undoubtedly, this is an
aspect that must be taken into account when explaining his literary choices at
all levels: from style (his marked tendency toward the emphatic and solemn), to
his stage treatment (attention to the spectacular), to his choice of themes
(history as the main subject), or to the generic preference of his works (no
other playwright’s repertoire contains such a high number of serious and
historical comedies, and yet so few, almost none, cloak-and-dagger plays
[comedias de capa y espada], so common
during this period).”[4]
The case of The Limping
Devil, however, is quite different. According to George Peale, Vélez de
Guevara wrote this novel without being concerned about his readers’ reactions:
“Since this work was the only case in which he moved away from his dramaturgy
to express ‘with particular whim’ (4), as he says, the personal experience of
his world without having to worry about the public’s reaction, one could deduce
that The Limping Devil is a sort of
personal manifesto, a self-exegesis of its author.”[5] Consequently, toward the
end of his life, Vélez de Guevara seems to have created the work he always
intended to write, one that bitterly criticizes most of Spanish society of the
period. To its detriment, however, it shamelessly praises many court
aristocrats, Vélez de Guevara’s benefactors.
Written
in a genre at times reminiscent of the picaresque tradition, The Limping Devil recounts the
adventures of a lame devil and a rascally student who frees him from an
astrologer’s bottle, as the two travel through Spain, observing and commenting
on all the foibles of its seventeenth-century society. These characters’ names
are of special interest. The student’s first name is Cleofás (according to Luke
24:18, Cleopas was a follower of Jesus who did not acknowledge the latter’s
resurrection); his middle name, Leandro, (Leander was a legendary figure who
swam the Hellespont to visit his lover, Hero); and his two last names: in the
third "Tranco" (or leap as befits a handicapped character on crutches),
Vélez de Guevara mocks those who change their humble surnames, such as Pérez
(one of the student’s surnames), López or Martínez, for more noble-sounding
ones, such as Guzmán, Mendoza, Cerda, and Zambullo, which stems from
the Spanish reflexive verb “zambullirse” (to immerse oneself). The devil does
not go by Lucifer, Satan, Beelzebub, Barabbas, Belial or Astarot. Instead, he
simply calls himself “The Limping Devil.” Describing himself as “the naughtiest
demon in hell,”[6]
he explains that his physical defect resulted from his fall from Heaven—the
first angel to tumble after a rebellion against God—as
the remaining fallen angels landed on him and forever crippled him. Dolores
Azorín Fernández associates the fact that one of the protagonists is a student
with the novel’s pedagogical bent (n.p.), Gareth A. Davis sees in Cleofás
not only Vélez’s greatest gracioso,
but also his depiction of a converso.
This persona likewise is a man of
many surnames, whose lineage on all sides is as insubstantial as the wind: he
is “Don Cleofás Leandro Pérez Zambullo, hidalgo a cuatro vientos, caballero
huracán y encrucijada de apellidos” [“Don Cleofás Leandro Pérez Zambullo,
hidalgo to four winds, hurricane knight and crossroads of last names.”] That
this disciple of the devil may be a cristiano nuevo is further suggested
by the information that he is an “hombre con el previlegio del bautismo” [man
with the privilege of baptism] if in this case the gracioso is not
exactly a moralising judge of the folly he sees, he is at least the means of
revealing it to the reader in all its confusion, hypocrisy, and lack of values.
(26)
The
story begins with the student Cleofás,, as he dashes across rooftops, flees
from the clutches of the law. He has been accused by a young “maiden,” who is no
maiden at all, having had eighty previous lovers, of rape. As he flings himself
through the window of an attic, he comes upon a tiny devil with a pumpkin-shaped head and a big mouth with only two fangs
for teeth. Two years earlier, the devil had been
imprisoned in a bottle by an elderly astrologer/necromancer who was
trying to use the demon’s supernatural powers for his own purposes. Even though
Cleofás finds him disgusting, he still needs the little devil if he is to leave
the attic and escape from law enforcement. When the student releases him from
his confinement, the mischievous
devil promises to repay him by revealing to him the true nature of
Spanish society. The devil takes Cleofás to the
highest tower in Madrid, removing the roofs to allow them to view the
affairs and vices of the “rational creepy-crawlers ”[7]
who dwell inside, a microcosm of the society of the
time. Throughout the novel, from the observations about actors, poets,
the nobility and society in general, we are presented with a striking parody
and a dark overview of the grotesque Spanish life of the time. Upon his first
look at the city, the student does not miss the opportunity to point out that
he knows the faces of rich men, but not the contents of their purses, thus
labeling them stingy. Later, in several other “trancos,” the student from the
University of Alcalá and the little devil cease to be mere spectators of
society and proceed to join the other characters in the novel’s plot.
We
are then presented with an unflattering view of the aristocracy, along with
that of lawyers, cuckolded husbands, fops, old crones in the business of
repairing hymens, hypocrites, thieves, unscrupulous tavern keepers, alchemists,
lotharios, cardsharps, matchmakers, misers, and others of the same ilk. In
another “leap,” our protagonists observe people walking down a street lined
with mirrors and watch them as, with exaggerated concern for their appearance,
they try to primp themselves up. We encounter various groups of pretenders here
as well, from lowly men and women contracted as footmen or squires by
pretend-ladies, to those who take on false titles of nobility. We also see people who eat opulent dinners even though
they have lost all their wealth to foreigners; a cantina owner diluting his
wine with water; a marquis who makes empty marriage promises to seduce young
women; a witch about to attend a Witches’ Sabbath; two thieves who rob a
foreigner; a restaurant owner who became wealthy by selling horse and cat meat
and passing it off as goat and rabbit, and who is not only too fat to fit in
her bed, but also in her house and even in the city of Madrid (the devil
humorously adds that no one so heavy can be lifted to Heaven); and even Tomasa,
Cleofás’s accuser, allows yet another man into her home for sexual purposes. They
next visit a “madhouse” where the inmates are only slightly less sane than
those on the outside. This scene provides the
novelist with an opportunity to mock another profession (earlier in the work, a
physician had killed all his patients), scholars, namely a grammarian who loses
his mind after he is unable to come up with the gerund of a Greek verb and a
historian because he cannot account for three decades of Titus Livius’s (Livy) life. Then, on another street, the student and the
devil come upon clothiers, who sell garments they removed from the exhumed
bodies of the recently deceased..
The
next “tranco” allows the author to compose one of the most humorous episodes of
the novel. Ensconced in an inn and temporarily abandoned by his devilish
companion, the student is awakened by someone shouting, “Fire!” As the guests
at the inn stream out of their rooms, they discover that the cause of the uproar
is a playwright who is enacting a scene that he wrote. Vélez de Guevara is now
enabled to satirize the styles of certain contemporary playwrights and their
extravagantly absurd scenes. Another lurch and an inn later, the student and the
gimpy devil find themselves defending the Spanish king before travelers from
France, England, Italy, and Germany. After they rid themselves of these
foreigners, they are visited by a company of actors. In this episode, Veléz de
Guevara, with all his theatrical experience, reveals certain petty jealousies
and other antics among performers.
In
succeeding chapters, Cleofás and the Limping Devil
travel to Toledo and, while the student sleeps, the Devil visits
Constantinople, Venice, Geneva, Milan, and Valencia, among other places. The
novel then gives us glimpses of the types of swordsmanship practiced at
the time as well as a scathing satire of physicians and pharmacists, while the
protagonists travel through the Sierra Morena,
Cordova, and Écija, the
author’s birthplace. This episode is followed by a dream-like scene that
describes a parade of the followers of Fortune, who include these are “lackeys”
such as Homer, Virgil, Petrarch, and the like. When the student points out that
these great poets have not prospered much, the devil answers—perhaps so as to
justify the author’s economic misfortune—that no one, in his own house,
possesses what he deserves. These poets are accompanied by great princes and
kings, and Fortune’s ladies: Foolishness, Fickleness, Flattery, Beauty,
Ambition, and Avarice. Other followers include thieves, astrologers,
matchmakers, and madmen. This scene is intended to depict a decaying society,
particularly by exposing its highest and most powerful members.
As
the motley crowd disappears, the devil and the student go on a sightseeing tour
of Seville. Through a magical mirror, the devil shows the student the Boulevard
(“Calle Mayor”) in Madrid, and offers a paean to many of the nobles strolling
there. This is one of the few episodes where the author does not strike a heavy
satirical blow on society, perhaps in realization that his economic survival
rests with this very group.
Finally,
the gimpy demon and his friend visit a literary academy in Seville, a milieu
with which the author was well acquainted, since he presided over a burlesque
academy called the Buen Retiro in 1637. After a side trip to a den of beggars,
the pair returns to the academy to address the assembled group. Here, the
student gives new compositional “rules”, brilliantly mocking the linguistic
excesses of poets and dramatists of the day. Suddenly, the academy is
interrupted by the accusing “maiden,” Tomasa, who
has been pursuing the student all the while. A
bailiff who accompanies her arrests the student and the devil, but later releases
them after accepting a bribe. Lucifer then sends a devil called “Cienllamas”
(“One Hundred Flames”), with two acolytes, to detain the fugitive devil,
following the astrologer’s complaint; the mischievous devil flees by possessing
the body of a scribe. The scribe goes to Hell, but is then released after he is
forced to vomit the Limping Devil inside him. Meanwhile, Cleofás flees from
Tomasa and heads to Alcalá de Henares to finish his studies. The novel
ends with a wonderfully executed burlesque scene in which everyone, the gimpy
devil included, receives their just desserts.
In The Limping Devil, Vélez de Guevara, like many of the
playwrights of his day, especially Lope de Vega, critiques the moral
deficiencies of society while concomitantly entertaining the reader. This acrid
criticism of the different professions and social groups—their picaresque ways,
misbehavior, misery, pretension, obsession with ethnic purity or with appearing
to be of a higher social status reveals that maintaining appearances was a
major concern of the period. Along with the generalized mood of the era, Vélez
de Guevara’s continuous financial problems plausibly contributed to his
disillusionment and pessimistic worldview. The author also includes a veiled
criticism of how Spain was governed, that is, its constant wars with other
countries and the dissipation of the gold and silver extracted from the
colonies, an enormous wealth that mostly ended up in other countries’ coffers.
The Limping Devil was written over a period of
years, from approximately 1636 to 1640. Though traditionally considered a
picaresque novel, it lacks, however, a common characteristic of that genre: an
autobiographical approach. Instead, written in the third person, we have a
student and a lame devil involved in several mostly unrelated adventures that
are narrated in “trancos.” Azorín Fernández provides additional reasons to question the picaresque
nature of this work:
Regarding the protagonists
of The Limping Devil, neither the
little devil nor the student can be described as pícaros, at least in the mentioned sense. Both are, at the
beginning of the story, marginalized from their social environment. But this
marginalization is temporary, it is the obligatory parenthesis that will give
rise to the construction of the work’s narrative coordinates. Thus, at the
conclusion of their adventures, each returns to his natural environment:
Cleofás, to continue his studies though somewhat disappointed; the Limping
Devil, after having exited the scribe’s body, is also reinstated to his place
of origin.[8]
Furthermore,
George Peale, and other critics have questioned whether The Limping Devil is a true novel, proposing instead that it is a
Menippean Satire because it lacks the unity expected in a novel (trancos or leaps, instead of chapters). Along these lines, Margarita Levisi
has analyzed the interaction of novelistic and dramatic traits in this work: “It is the author himself who gives us the clue by
announcing in the prologues—although written a posteriori—his supposed
liberation from dramatic obligations.”[9] In any case, while
the character of a gimpy devil was well known in Spanish proverbs, sayings, and
folk tunes before Vélez de Guevara’s novel, one may also find a similar theme,
as several critics have indicated, in those magic
lenses included in Rodrígo Fernández de Ribera’s Los anteojos de mejor vista
( Would a better translation be Corrective
Eyeglasses? I question Best-View.
, 1620–1625).
Twenty-first century readers may find some passages in
the novel offensive, such as the one in the first “tranco,” where the devil
refers to hell as an “infernal Guinea.”[10] One can also sense a
hardly veiled xenophobia in those passages where foreigners who reside in Spain
are described as parasites who not only take Spanish wealth, but also
disrespect the king; the little demon is particularly critical of Switzerland,
whose citizens are said to be devils themselves and are almost as bad as
Spaniards living in the Americas (an implicit criticism of expatriates). There
are even Orientalist echoes when the devil travels to Constantinople to unsettle the
Great Turk’s harem and to kill his twelve or thirteen brothers so as to avoid a
conspiracy. Similarly, when the Limping Devil points out that the wealthiest
and most powerful men in the world, accompanying Fortune in her parade, are
also the most foolish, Don Cleofás retorts, echoing the period’s misogyny that,
since Fortune is a woman’s name (in Spanish), as a female she always chooses
the worst characters.
Some
years after The Limping Devil’s
publication, similar characters appeared in English literature and art.[11]
These characters, however, do not appear to be due to Vélez de Guevara’s work,
but instead point to a French “translation” of El diablo cojuelo, Le diable
boiteux (1707) by Alain-René Lesage. Lesage's adaptation includes the same
characters as the Spanish original and part of the plot, but he also takes some
authorial liberties.. Although the French work begins with the same premise–a
Spanish student frees a spirit from a bottle and together they fly to Madrid to
peer down into people’s homes, the adventure soon changes to satirize Parisian
society. Lesage also turns the spirit into a combination of devil and Cupid who
presides over several love affairs, both successful and disastrous. Lesage’s
work proved so popular that, within four months of its publication, it had
reached nine editions, with forty-two more to be published by century’s end. Le diable boiteux is still published
today, and it has also been adapted for the stage.
Lesage’s
work also became very well known to the English-speaking world through its
translations into the English language. In fact, only one year after
publication of Le diable boiteux an
anonymously translated version appeared, entitled The Devil Upon Two Sticks (1708). Tobias Smollet’s translation of Lesage, The Devil Upon Crutches, followed in 1750. And there even appeared
a “continuation” of the French novel by William Combe, The Devil Upon Two Sticks in England, published in six volumes
(1790-91). As further evidence of the widespread influence of The Limping Devil in English literature,
we find Charles Dickens opening chapter 33 of his The Old Curiosity Shop (1840-1841) in the following way:
As the course of this tale
requires that we should become acquainted, somewhere hereabouts, with a few
particulars connected with the domestic economy of Mr. Sampson Brass, and as a
more convenient place than the present is not likely to occur for that purpose,
the historian takes the friendly reader by the hand, and springing with him
into the air, and cleaving the same at a greater rate than ever Don Cleophas
Leandro Perez Zambullo and his familiar travelled through that pleasant region
in company, alights with him upon the pavement of Bevis Marks. (149)
In
short, the influence of Lesage’s novel can readily be seen in English
literature and art, but none has been attributable to Luis Vélez de Guevara’s
original work.
Our
purpose, then, is to finally bring this original Spanish work to light for
English readers. This novel and other Spanish works became the basis for the
European modern novel and, as such, they are worthy of attention well beyond
that of Spanish-language readers. Although The
Limping Devil’s language is highly baroque and some of its passages remain
virtually incomprehensible to even the most learned, it has been our intention
to translate the work into a highly readable text, supplemented by an abundant
number of explanatory footnotes. And as Vélez
de Guevara says, we pray “that whoever reads it will be entertained, and will
not be worn out by its words and will find them pleasurable.”
Works Cited
Azorín Fernández, Dolores. El Diablo Cojuelo: glosario e índices léxicos. Biblioteca
Virtual Miguel de Cervantes. Alicante: Biblioteca Virtual Miguel de Cervantes. 2000. Web. 29
Nov. 2017.
Davis, Gareth A. “Luis Vélez de Guevara and Court
Life.” Alicante: Biblioteca Virtual
Miguel de Cervantes, 2013. Digital edition based on C. George Peale (ed.), Antigüedad
y actualidad de Luis Vélez de Guevara: estudios críticos John Benjamins
Publishing Company, 1983. 20-38.
Dickens, Charles. The
Old Curiosity Shop. London: Champan & Hall, 1848.
Levisi,
Margarita. “Los aspectos teatrales de El
Diablo Cojuelo.” Alicante: Biblioteca
Virtual
Miguel de Cervantes, 2013. Digital edition based on
C. George Peale, ed., Antigüedad y actualidad de Luis Vélez de Guevara:
estudios críticos. Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company, 1983. 207-18.
Peale,
C. George. “Ingenio y cortesanía en El
Diablo Cojuelo. Dos
notas sobre el haz y el
envés de Vélez de Guevara.” Alicante:
Biblioteca Virtual Miguel de Cervantes, 2013. Digital edition based on C.
George Peale (ed.), Antigüedad y actualidad de Luis Vélez de Guevara:
estudios críticos Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company, 1983.
233-53.
---.
“Prólogo”. Alicante: Biblioteca Virtual
Miguel de Cervantes, 2013. Digital edition based on C. George Peale (ed.), Antigüedad
y actualidad de Luis Vélez de Guevara: estudios críticos. Amsterdam: John
Benjamins Publishing Company, 1983. IX-XII.
Profeti, Maria Grazia. “Emisor y receptores: Luis
Vélez de Guevara y el enfoque crítico.”
Alicante: Biblioteca Virtual Miguel de Cervantes, 2013. Digital edition based on C. George Peale, ed., Antigüedad y
actualidad de Luis Vélez de Guevara: estudios críticos. Amsterdam: John
Benjamins Publishing Company, 1983.. 1-19.
Vega García-Luengos, Germán. “El autor: Perfil
biográfico.” Biblioteca Virtual Miguel
de Cervantes.
http://www.cervantesvirtual.com/portales/velez_de_guevara/autor_biografia/?_ga=2.229084063.2064845874.1511885574-103728094.1500737946. 29 Nov.
2017.
Wilks, Kerry K.
“Staging Graciosos in America.” https://spanish-golden-age-plays.wikispaces.com/Staging+Graciosos+in+America+%28Wilks%29.
2009. Accessed 2 Dec. 2017.
[1] As George
Peale points out,
Miguel de Cervantes, in Viaje del Parnaso,
praises Vélez de Guevara as “Lustre y alegría y
discreción del trato cortesano” (“Luster and
joy and discretion of courtly behavior;” “Ingenio y cortesanía” 233). Peale also reminds us that Quevedo includes Vélez
de Guevara, along with Lope de Vega and Calderón, as the best representatives
of the Spanish comedy (“Prólogo” x).
[2] As Kerry K. Wilks explains, “The gracioso often crosses generic
lines, encapsulating both the comic and tragic moments in a comedia,
creating a complexity inherent in this role. This dichotomy is even more
pronounced in dramas (deliberate use of term) that are often anthologized or
staged in the U.S. (for example, Lope’s Fuente
Ovejuna or Calderón’s La vida es sueño). Nevertheless, even plays
written in a largely comic vein such as the comedia de capa y espada
(cape and sword plays), have graciosos that do not respond to a purely
comic caricature. The gracioso represents more than humor, more the
“schtick,” as he is both funny and heart rending. He encompasses a humor that
often leads us to the pathos of the work.” (n.p.).
[3] Other important titles are El capitán prodigioso, príncipe
de Transilvania
(1597-1598), El espejo del mundo (1602-1603), La devoción de la misa
(1604-1610), El rey don Sebastián (1604-1608), La obligación a las
mujeres y duquesa de Sajonia (1606-1610), Los fijos de la Barbuda (1608-1610), Don Pedro Miago (1613), El conde don Pero Vélez (1615), El caballero del sol (1617), Virtudes vencen señales (1617), Amor
es naturaleza (1617-1618), El lucero de Castilla (1618-1619), El rey en su imaginación (1624-1625), Las palabras a los reyes (1625-1626),
El príncipe esclavo (primera y segunda partes) (1628), Correr por amor
fortuna (1632), and El águila del agua (1632-1633).
[4] “Un teatro acorde con su genio personal
pero también a gusto de los patronos. Indudablemente, este es un aspecto que
hay que tener muy en cuenta a la hora de explicar sus opciones literarias en
todos los niveles: desde el estilo (así, esa notada tendencia a lo enfático y
solemne), al tratamiento escénico (su atención a lo espectacular), la elección
de temas (con la historia como materia principal) o la adscripción genérica de
sus obras (ningún otro repertorio alcanza un porcentaje tan alto de comedias
serias e historiales, y tan escaso, casi nulo, de las de capa y espada, tan
habitual en otros dramaturgos)” (n.p.).
[5] “Puesto que esta obra fue la única ocasión en que se apartó de su
teatro para manifestar ‘con particular capricho’ (p. 4), como él mismo dice, la
vivencia personal de su mundo notado sin tener que preocuparse de la reacción
del público, podría decirse que El Diablo Cojuelo es una manera de
manifiesto personal, una auto-exégesis de su autor” (“Ingenio y cortesanía”
234).
[8] “Por lo que hace a los protagonistas del Cojuelo, ni el
diablillo ni el estudiante pueden calificarse de pícaros, al menos, en el
sentido en el que antes hemos hecho alusión. Tanto uno como otro se encuentran
al inicio del relato al margen de su medio social. Pero esta marginación es
temporal, constituye el obligado paréntesis que dará pie a la construcción de
las coordenadas narrativas de la obra. Así, al finalizar la peripecia de ambos,
cada uno vuelve a su medio natural: Don Cleofás, a continuar sus estudios, no
sin cierto bagaje de desengaño; y el Cojuelo, tras ser engullido por el
escribano, es reintegrado asimismo a su lugar de origen” (20).
[9] “Es el mismo autor quien nos lleva sobre esta pista al anunciar desde
los prólogos—aunque hayan sido escritos ‘a posteriori’—su supuesta liberación
del quehacer teatral” (216).
[11] These
include the following: The Devil upon Two
Sticks: Or the Town Until’d… as it is Acted in Pinkeman’s both in May-Fair
(1708); Perseus and Andromeda: Or, the
Devil upon Two Sticks; in Five Interludes: Three Serious and Two Comic,
composed by Mons. Roger (1729); Devil
upon Two Sticks: Or, a Hue and Cry after the Drapier’s Club, written by the
Clerk of the parish (1736); “The Devil Upon Two Sticks,” a satirical engraving
of Sir Robert Walpole by Hubert-François Gravelot (1741); The Devil upon Two Sticks, or, the Country Beau, a Ballad Farce of One
Act, by Charles Coffey (1745): The
Devil upon Crutches in England: Or Night Scenes in London, by a Gentleman
of Oxford (1759); and The Devil upon Two
Sticks: A Comedy in Three Acts, by Samuel Foote (1768).
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2 comentarios:
have a great day
Thank you for your amazing work! Really interesting =)
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