The lovers of Verona in Lope de Vega and Shakespeare: Problems in comparison.
Item
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Title
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The lovers of Verona in Lope de Vega and Shakespeare: Problems in comparison.
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Identifier
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AAI9029911
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identifier
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9029911
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Creator
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Badendyck, Cynthia Rodriguez.
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Contributor
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Adviser: Fred Nichols
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Date
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1990
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Language
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English
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Publisher
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City University of New York.
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Subject
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Literature, Comparative | Literature, English | Literature, Romance | Theater
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Abstract
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Lope de Vega's three-act tragicomedia Castelvines y Monteses, written between 1606 and 1612, is the most important contemporary analogue extant of Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet. Yet Castelvines y Monteses is a play that has received very little attention and virtually no serious study.;The present essay argues that political and cultural prejudices dating back to the century in which Lope and Shakespeare were born have rendered Castelvines y Monteses invisible. Therefore, the first part of the essay is devoted to examining the most conspicuous of those prejudicial elements: first, the so-called Black Legend--anti-Spanish propaganda disseminated initially at the time of the Armada and revitalized whenever Anglo and Hispanic interests have come into conflict; second, the exaltation of Shakespeare as an icon of British cultural hegemony; and third, the "internalized" Black Legend by which Spaniards have projected Spain's economic and political decline upon racial and cultural "sins" supposed to be particularly apparent in the drama of Spain's most powerful period.;The rest of the essay studies how these prejudices have both restricted and distorted what we allow ourselves to see in the two plays, and argues that by a number of traditional standards regularly applied to Romeo and Juliet, Castelvines y Monteses is in fact a better play--more plausible, more controlled, more resonant, more complex, more aesthetically satisfying, less specious. Chapters discuss issues of genre, pederastic subtext vectored by the prepubescent boy actress of Shakespeare's stage, the relationship of love to feud, and the implications of death and reconciliation.
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Type
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dissertation
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Source
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PQT Legacy CUNY.xlsx
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degree
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Ph.D.
