Don Juan in Search of Identity in the Play "La Nuit de Valognes" by Éric-Emanuel Schmitt

The first play by the contemporary French writer Éric-Emanuel Schmitt, The Night in Valognes (La Nuit de Valognes, 1989), represents a completely new interpretation of the myth originating from the 17th century, and celebrated in the writings of many subsequent authors, from Tirso de Molina, over Molière and Mozart, to Ballester and Handke. The play is situated in a castle in northern France, taking place some thirty years after the well-known adventures of Don Juan, and represents a trial organized by five women, his former lovers. However, the penalty – to marry his last victim, is not executed. The aim of the paper is to argue that in this humorous philosophical play, written by the end of the 20th century, Schmitt is not interested in the problem of seduction, represented in the classical myth, but in the quest of the main character for his identity. His hero does not give the answer to the key question: “Who am I?”, but instead poses the question if our sexual identities are solid and unchangeable. The hero’s search for identity is presented as the quality of contemporary man, re-examining his sexuality through search for love, as well as homosexuality, hinted at in the play as one possible modern identity of Don Juan.

Discursos «feministas» en boca de damas de comedias de Tirso de Molina

El riquísimo teatro español de la Edad de Oro –sus creadores– hizo un regalo impagable a nuestra sociedad: permitió ver en un escenario a personajes que se comportaban de manera asombrosa e inconveniente para su tiempo, rompiendo las normas sociales, y con ello pintaban un horizonte futuro en que quizás fuera real lo que se presentaba como deseable y justo. Eran ficticios, inventados, pero parecía de verdad lo que hacían y decían; y podían asombrar o incluso escandalizar al espectador, pero le ofrecían ideas que tal vez no se le hubieran ocurrido, o sí, pero casi seguro no se atrevía a verbalizar. Me voy a adentrar en el terreno en que esto sucede sin castigo, utilizando la diversión como finalidad: la comedia. No lo hago en el del entremés porque lo bufo, la burla, la exageración le da una vuelta de tuerca excesiva a los sucesos, a la transgresión, y aleja esa sensación de ser espectadores de algo real y posible que nos da el género mesuradamente cómico.

Tradução e publicação de teatro espanhol em Portugal

Considerando a proeminência do teatro no contexto cultural espanhol, tanto no que diz respeito à herança teatral do “Siglo de Oro” como à relevante produção dramática contemporânea, torna-se oportuno verificar de que modo, e em que medida, a tradução tem contribuído para o conhecimento deste campo do universo literário espanhol em Portugal. Este estudo foca-se nas traduções de teatro espanhol publicadas em livro, em especial no âmbito de duas coleções: “Civilização Teatro”, editada na década de 1960, e “Livrinhos de Teatro”, em publicação desde 2003. Após a caracterização de cada uma das coleções, a análise centra-se em dois volumes: a tradução das “comedias” O sedutor de Sevilha e o convidado de pedra, O amor médico, e O tímido no palácio, de Tirso de Molina (1967), e a tradução das peças O Crítico, Reiquiavique, e O Cartógrafo, de Juan Mayorga (2018). Argumenta-se que, no contexto das inter-relações literárias e culturais no universo ibérico, estes casos testemunham ambos um efetivo esforço de conhecimento e divulgação em Portugal da produção teatral espanhola; contudo, os diferentes pressupostos que guiam esse esforço ecoam os distintos contextos históricos em que se situam os processos tradutórios e os projetos editoriais em causa.

Feminism and Gynecocracy in Classical Autors Dona María de Zayas Sotomayor and Tirso de Molain

This study based on María de Zayas Sotomayor and Tirso de Molina, especially on their classical Golden Age books Prudence in Woman and Amorous and Exemplary Novels, has for purposes to raise the question of women empowerment again and analyze their handling approaches of the feminist subject matter, to identify and suggest solutions to the hindrances of the solvency of that social phenomenon of women discrimination now a days. We carried it out by socio-critical approach and with objective, comparative, esthetical and analytic heuristic methods. It turns out of our work that both of María de Zayas Sotomayor and Tirso de Molina are feminist writers, but there are some subtle differences between them: Tirso de Molina put special emphasis on women political skills, whereas María de Zayas develops femininity, condemns their objectification by men and advocates their intellectual and social emancipation. Apart from that, our analyzes revealed that social and cultural obstacles continue to maintain the phenomenon. We proposed a cleaning up of the habits and the lifting of old fashioned taboo, mainly in African cultural areas where such habits are still unchanging.

Reseña de Tirso de Molina (2018): La santa Juana. Segunda parte

Reseña de Tirso de Molina (2018): La santa Juana. Segunda parte.

Lesia Ukrainka, Don Juan and Europe: ideology and eropolitics in the Stone Master

The article is focused on Lesia Ukrainka’s famous drama The Stone Master (Kaminnyi Hospodar), her remake of the Don Juan legend. The author of the article, Ukrainian philosopher Volodymyr Yermolenko, localizes Lesia’s masterpiece in a broader European tradition of the legend. He compares The Stone Master with the previous version of the Don Juan legend, by Tirso de Molina (The Trickster of Seville), Moli re (Dom Juan), Mozart (Don Giovanni), Hoffmann (Don Juan), Grabbe (Faust and Don Juan) and others. He analyzes Lesia’s originality within this tradition. He also reads The Stone Master in the context of the dialogue between different epochs: the Baroque, Classicism, Rococo / Enlightenment, Romanticism, Post-Romanticism. Each of the epochs develops its specific version of Don Juan legend, according to Yermolenko, which reflects a specific concept of human being and human relations developed at each particular period. While the “Baroque” Don Juan of Tirso de Molina marks the crisis of the culture of honor, the “Classicist” Don Juan of Moli re shows the development of a culture of knowledge and general concepts, and the “Romantic” Don Juan of Byron and Hoffmann is a symptorm of a new 19th century culture of will and transformation. In this respect, it is important to look at Lesia Ukrainka’s text as a battleground of “Romantic” will to freedom and “Post-Romantic” (or fin de siècle) will to power. In this context, Yermolenko reads The Stone Master (written in 1912) as a criticism of the fashionable topic of “will to power”, and as a political warning, with Lesia Ukrainka showing the upcoming horrors of the 20th century’s authoritarianism and totalitarianism. With the help of the concept of eropolitics, the author shows how, through the erotic topic, Lesia Ukrainka passed a major political message to her epoch — and ours as well.

Texto, atribución y censura de Próspera y Adversa fortuna de Don Álvaro de Luna

El artículo plantea la problemática que gira en torno a Próspera y Adversa fortuna de don Álvaro de Luna, que comprende tanto los errores de atribución de la obra como los conflictos que pareció tener con la censura, y que da lugar a un enredo bibliográfico en el que se ven envueltos nada menos que cuatro autores: Tirso de Molina, Mira de Amescua, Lope de Vega y Salucio del Poyo. Asimismo, ofrece un breve estado de la cuestión acerca de la situación actual del teatro de Mira tras ser analizado por la herramienta digital de la Estilometría, que lo convierte en el dramaturgo áureo más afectado por los problemas de atribución.