Eth Spromanticism

1 The Spanish culture of the 18th and 19th centuries was one of violence and contradiction. The Catholic Church maintained supremacy by punishing heretics during the Spanish Inquisition. Simultaneously, the Spanish people superstitiously bought charms and used the services of spell-casters for healing and protection. Honor morphed from referring to a respectable person to a form of extreme pride that called for a man to publicly defend, usually by duel, his name and his family if honor was questioned. Love affairs ran rampant although frowned upon by the Church and also compromised a woman’s honor, since honor referred to her chastity or fidelity. Written in 1844, José Zorrilla’s Don Juan Tenorio sufficiently reflects this violent, contradictory society. José Zorrilla, 1817-1893, was the son of a stern and conservative Spaniard who served as a high-ranking member of Ferdinand VII’s police.1 In his early years, Zorrilla studied science and philosophy. He entered the University of Toledo to study law but became infatuated with the bohemian lifestyle and began visiting cemeteries at night, studying ruins, old churches, and other sites steeped in local traditions.2 Scandalized by this lifestyle, his father sent him to the University of Valladolid where a relative could better oversee his behavior. However, the plan failed, and when his father threatened to send him to their estate, Zorrilla “made a romantic escape by leaping from a carriage to a mule and vanishing into Madrid.”3 In Madrid, Zorrilla pursued the bohemian lifestyle of the Romantic writers. He remained an unnoticed poet until the funeral of Mariano José de Larra. The literati of Madrid publicly paid homage to their esteemed colleague with poetry and eulogies despite the fact he 1 Oscar, Mandel, ed., The Theatre of Don Juan: A Collection of Plays and Views, 16301963( Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1963), 464. 2 Ibid. 3 Ibid.

2 committed suicide. Zorrilla appeared from the crowd at the ceremony and read an ode to Larra. “Overcome by emotion and hunger, Zorrilla fainted before he could finish.”4 His ode was an inspiration to his audience, and Zorrilla found overnight fame. His Romantic idols became his co-workers and friends. He wrote eight volumes of poetry and nearly forty plays. Don Juan Tenorio, still produced throughout Spain on All Souls Day, is a reflection of the Spanish traditions Zorrilla observed and studied as a Romantic poet. The official religion in Spain during the 18th and 19th centuries was Catholicism, but popular culture combined Catholic beliefs with superstition. People bought charms and incantations to protect themselves from Satan and misfortune,5 and spell-casters exorcised spirits using rituals derived from the theology of the Crucifixion.6 The Catholic Church was intent on commanding the Spanish people and was known for its violent punishment of heretics, any non-Christian or unrepentant person, during the Spanish Inquisition. Joan Curbet in her essay, “‘Hallelujah to your dying screams of torture’: representations of ritual violence in English and Spanish Romanticism,” cites the dream of a main character from Charles Maturin’s Melmouth the Wanderer, who is a prisoner of the Inquisition.7 The passage reveals the dream of a terrified human awaiting physical torture. I saw myself in the garment of condemnation, the flames pointing upwards, while the demons painted on my dress were mocked by the demons who beset my feet, and hovered round my temples. The Jesuits on each side of me, urged me to consider the difference between these painted fires, and those which were about to enwrap my writhing soul for an eternity of ages. All the bells of Madrid seemed to be ringing in my ears. There was no light but a dull twilight, such as one always sees in his sleep, 4 Felicia, Londré, The History of World Theater: From the English Restoration to the Present (New York: Continuum, 1999), 245. 5 Bartolomé Bennassar, The Spanish Character: Attitudes and Mentalities from the Sixteenth to the Nineteenth Century, trans. Benjamin Keen (University of California Press), 91. 6 Bennassar, 87. 7 Horner, Avril, ed., European Gothic: A Spirited Exchange 1760-1960 (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2002), 161.

3 (no man ever dreamed of sun-light);--there was a dim and smoky blaze of torches in my eyes, whose flames were soon to be in my eyes [...] The next moment I was chained to my chair again,--the fires were lit, the bells rang out, the litanies were sung;--my feet were scorched to a cinder,--my muscles cracked, my blood and marrow hissed, my flesh consumed like shrinking leather,--the bones of my legs hung two black withering and moveless sticks in the ascending blaze;--it ascended, caught my hair,--I was crowned with fire. (Horner 2002, 162.) This dream is comparable to the scene of The Mercy of God and the Apotheosis of Love, Part II, Act Three, in Don Juan Tenorio. Don Juan knocks on Don Gonzalo’s tomb, and the tomb becomes a parody of the feast that occurs at Juan’s house in the previous act. A horrifying feast ensues with the following description: Instead of the garlands that gathered the table cloth into flounces, instead of the beautiful flowers and silverware, this table is decorated with snakes, bones, and fire. Placed upon the table are a large platter of ashes, a goblet of fire, and an hourglass. As this change occurs all the other graves open disgorging their skeletons wrapped in shrouds. Ghosts, skeletons, and spirits hover about in the background. (Zorrilla 1963, 535) Don Juan witnesses a glimpse of the hell that Don Gonzalo’s statue warns will await him if he remains unrepentant in his approaching death. The torture causes him to ask God for mercy. Don Gonzalo’s statue replies to this outcry: “It is too late!”8 This scene directly relates to the horrors of the Inquisition which ended in 1834, just ten years before Zorrilla wrote this play. However, Zorrilla adds a Romantic twist to the plot and allows the pure love of Doňa Ines to overcome Don Juan’s sins. The play also provides an image of the convents of 19th century Spain. A trend for sending young girls to convents grew out of the economic decline in the early 17th century and continued through the 18th and early 19th centuries.9 If a father had many daughters, he would send some of them to join the church and by doing so, keep the dowry of one or two daughters at a manageable amount. This situation occurs in Don Juan Tenorio. Doňa Ines 8 José Zorrilla, Don Juan Tenorio, trans. William I. Oliver. In Mandel, pp. 469-538. 9 Bennassar, 83.

4 resides in the convent at Seville. Her father sent her there as a young girl, possibly for the purpose of richly dowering some other daughters, but apparently changed his mind and gave her to Don Juan to “settle some legal suit.”10 Brigida, Doňa Ines’ duenna, describes the girl’s development inside the convent. She’s never talked to a soul outside of her home and they've watched over her day and night. What with all those dreary years of solitude in the convent, they managed to bind her thought and cramp her mind until her whole world had shrunk to a mean little circle in which the cloister and the altar were her destiny and goal. (Zorrilla, 496) Doňa Ines is first seen in her cell at the convent. In her monologue, she admits that she trembles at the idea of taking her vows. She also knows she will soon lose her duenna because taking her vows means giving up everything she loves. She is an example of the young girls who were robbed of the joys of life and sacrificed to enrich a sister’s dowry. There was an excessive need for sacrifice and violent ritual in Spanish religion during this time that extended far beyond the sacrifice of Christ observed in the Eucharist. Curbet again displays a horrifying scene of Spanish religious practice in her work, this time citing Blanco White’s Spanish Letters. The defrocked priest describes a religious procession in the early 19th century. Before joining the procession, they began wounding their backs, and soon they started hitting each other until the blood ran down their clothes. It is plain to see that religion did not have anything to do with these voluntary flagellations. In truth, there was an extended belief that this act had also an extraordinary effect upon the physical wellbeing of those who participated in it. (Horner 2002, 167) It is obvious that violence and bloodshed were viewed as necessary and at this point passed beyond Catholicism to pervade the entire culture. White also writes of a need for sacrifice in the sake of honor that he witnessed during the War of Independence in the early 19th century. White and a friend had escaped from Madrid and were bound for Seville to join 10 Zorrilla, 496.

5 patriots. Traveling through an Extremadura that was up in arms...they faced a menacing crowd. “‘We wish, sir, to kill somebody,’ said the spokesman of the insurgents. ‘Someone has been killed in Trujillo; one or two others at Badajoz, another a Merida, and we will not be behind our neighbors. Sir, we will kill a traitor.’” (Bennassar 1975, 232) With these first hand instances of bloodshed and sacrifice in mind, it is no surprise that Doňa Ines serves as a sacrifice for Don Juan’s salvation. The ghost of Doňa Ines tells Juan: “I offered God my soul in ransom for your sinful one. And God, beholding the tenderness of my love, replied, ‘Wait for Don Juan in your grave. Since you choose to be faithful to such a hell-inspired love, you’ll earn your salvation with Juan, or with Juan you will lose it.’”11 In previous accounts of Don Juan, he spends eternity in hell for his sins on earth, but Zorrilla’s use of pure love as a sacrifice is fitting for the Spanish audience of his time. Zorrilla does justice to Spanish culture by setting the first scene of the play amidst a festival. Spain held festivals for almost any occasion including Christmas, Easter, Pentecost, war victories, royal births, in honor of visiting nobility, and even to mark the end of plagues. The Spaniards' delight in sociability brought about the daily tertuilas. The tertuila was an informal evening party that did not require invitation and consisted of cards, games, dancing, and singing.12 Sometimes festivals were quickly planned for a visiting official of the government or church. Blanco White tells of a spontaneous festival held in Olvera. Each evening the parents of the young men whose genealogical tree he had come to examine to obtain proof of his “purity of blood” gave a ball in their honor, and numerous couples came to dance seguidillas, accompanied by singers and guitars. (Bennassar 1975, 155) Uproar and Licentiousness, Part I, Act 1, occurs during Seville’s Carnival festival. The opening image is of “costumed revellers...carrying torches, playing music, singing, and

11 Zorrilla, 524. 12 Bennassar 168.

6 dancing.”13 The festival provides the characters with the mysteriousness of being in costume and hides the fathers, Don Gonzales and Don Diego, from Don Juan for “during Carnival the noblest of men can wear a mask without dishonor.”14 Setting the first scene during a festival provides the perfect atmosphere for settling a bet. Gambling, especially card playing, was closely tied to festivals and other social events.15 Although Zorrilla does not include cards, the stakes are much higher than losing money in the bet between Don Juan and Don Luis. The original bet was “to see who could do more harm with more luck in the course of one year.”16 Because Don Juan wins the bet by having a longer list of victims than Don Luis, Don Luis notes that “a novice on the eve of taking her vows”17 is missing from Don Juan’s list of female conquests. Don Juan bets his life he can add such a woman to his list as well as Don Luis’s bride. Don Luis accepts his gamble, and the play follows Don Juan fulfilling this bet and maintaining his honor through the end of Part I. Honor was no longer a description reserved for the respectable person in 18th and 19thcentury Spain. Bartolomé Bennassar, in The Spanish Character, defines honor. This special form of pride demanded the transcendence of the individual at the cost of one’s life, if necessary. This means that the display of honor is almost always public; it requires witness. It is by virtue of its public character that honor becomes a socialized value based on reputation and transcends the individual. Accordingly, a man or a woman can lose his or her honor without having acted dishonorably. (Bennassar 1975, 215) Honor was also no longer limited to nobility or the honest poor. Even a thief could be honorable. An honorable thief was one who kept his pledged word. Bennassar cites an affair 13 Zorrilla, 472. 14 Zorrilla, 475. 15 Bennassar, 165. 16 Zorrilla, 474. 17 Zorrilla, 484.

7 that occurred in 1723 when bandits planned an attack on a convoy but realized that the leader of the party paid taxes to them. The bandits exclaimed: “Ah! Pardon us, Seňor Lanza, we did not recognize you; we are honest people and would never commit such a disgraceful thing; we are too honorable to take so much as a cigar from you.”18 From this occurrence, it is not difficult to accept Don Juan’s comment when trying to devise a plan to enter the chamber of Don Luis’ bride: “I must make sure, by God. I stand a chance of losing both wager and reputation.”19 Although a rogue, Don Juan’s honor was still at stake. Honor was an element of society that could not be taken lightly. Sacrifice was often necessary to keep one’s honor. Court proceedings show lists of prisoners, galley slaves, and even executions of “‘honorable men’ who became murderers as a result of brawls or because they killed their wives.”20 A husband might kill his wife in vengeance for such a dishonor as infidelity. Don Diego keeps his honor by sacrificing a relationship with his degenerate son, Don Juan, and leaves after telling Don Juan: “I know longer know you.”21 Despite his miscreant reputation or perhaps because of it, Don Juan is held accountable for his honor with the added taste of machismo. Machismo is the personal style with which a person faces enemies and even death. This style is characterized by the composed yet dashing, daring, and “devil-may-care” attitude that is so obvious in the character of Don Juan.22 Don Juan is forced to uphold his honor by murdering Don Gonzales and Don Luis. Don Luis comes to kill Don Juan for dishonoring his bride, but Don Juan instead kills him to settle Don Luis’s debt since he staked his life on the bet he lost with Don 18 Bennassar, 221. 19 Zorrilla, 493. 20 Bennassar, 233. 21 Zorrilla, 485. 22 Timothy, Mitchell, Violence and Piety in Spanish Folklore (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1988), 176.

8 Juan. Don Gonzales also comes to kill Don Juan for dishonoring his daughter by stealing her from the convent. He rebukes Don Juan: “to pollute her virgin soul with the gall of your own which is dry of virtue and faith! To soil the honor of my crest as though it were some ragpicker’s trash. Is that the measure of your courage? Is that the well-known daring that’s struck fear into the whole country?”23 Before killing the two characters, who call him a coward, Don Juan tells them: “For fear you'll besmirch my honor, I'll take the opportunity you offer me to show myself the Tenorio whose courage you have questioned.”24 He calmly shoots Don Gonzalo and stabs Don Luis. Adding machismo to keeping his honor, Don Juan escapes by jumping off the balcony and into the river where a boat is waiting for his escape. Contrary to the influence of the Catholic Church and the code of honor that called for a woman to be chaste or faithful, love affairs were abundant in Spain during the 18th and 19th centuries. Bennassar presents a late 18th-century anecdote about the town of Cartagena. A married man bets he could cause a great disturbance throughout town that evening. He did so by returning home earlier than usual but carefully gave his wife’s lover time to leave. The event caused a chain reaction that spread throughout the town by which he easily won his bet.25 Love affairs were fashionable, but the theologians abhorred them. One such theologian, Archbishop Bartolomé de Carranza, believed syphilis was sent by God to punish the rampant sexual licentiousness, but admitted it “provoked neither fear nor repulsion...to have it or have had it is regarded as a thing proper to a courtier, and there is not a man of the palace or court who will not do all that is necessary to have it.”26 This cultural fad is apparent in Don Juan Tenorio in the first scene. After presenting his list of female conquests to Don Luis, Don Juan 23 Zorrilla, 515. 24 Zorrilla, 517. 25 Bennassar, 203. 26 Bennassar, 202.

9 gloats: “From a princess to a fisherman’s daughter. I've loved my way up and down the social ladder!”27 Remaining true to the Romantic idea of love and the loyalties of Spanish culture, Zorrilla makes pure love an acceptable sacrifice for Don Juan’s sins. Doňa Ines’ innocent love is a “credit balance” that she transfers to Juan’s “spiritual account.”28 Don Juan realizes the goodness in Doňa Ines and is willing to sacrifice his machismo and roguish sense of honor to be her slave. As he risks his honor to kneel as a coward before Don Gonzalo’s feet, he reasons with her father: I worship Doňa Ines. I’m convinced that Heaven has granted her to me to turn my steps in the paths of righteousness. I didn’t love her beauty nor did I worship her charms. Don Gonzalo, what I adore in Doňa Ines is her goodness. That which judges and bishops could not bring me to with threats of jail and sermons was accomplished by her purity. Her love has transformed me into a new man; it has renewed my whole being. She can make an angel of one who was a devil. Listen well, Don Gonzalo, to what Don Juan is offering you at your feet. (Mandel 1963, 516) Don Gonzalo denies Don Juan his daughter’s hand in marriage, and forces Don Juan to wait until death to experience the saving grace of Doňa Ines’ goodness and pure love. The character of Don Juan is a result of the violent and contradictory culture that pervaded Spanish society during the 18th and 19th centuries. Don Juan maintains a skewed sense of honor that allows him such misdeeds as stealing a girl from a convent, taking another man’s bride, and kneeling before his enemy. However, he is bound by honor to keep his word and fulfill his bets. He believes Doňa Ines is his way to salvation but murders her father to save his honor and makes a romantic escape without considering the security of her honor after stealing her from the convent. Only in the end does he beg for God’s mercy, and it is not the mercy of God that saves him but the pure love of Doňa Ines. Don Juan’s 27 Zorrilla, 483. 28 Donald L. Shaw, A Literary History of Spain: The Nineteenth Century (New York: Barnes and Noble, 1972), 36.

10 character is a miniature model of the multi-faceted, opposing forces Zorrilla observed in Spanish culture. Don Juan Tenorio depicts the Spanish culture of the 18th and 19th centuries as contradictory and violent. It shows the conflicting features of Spanish culture that emerged from the entangling of religion, love, and honor when each moved excessively and uncontrollably through the society. Don Juan is the result of these merging aspects of the culture and comes to a good end only because of the pure love of Doňa Ines. Zorrilla paints a clear picture of the effects of these contradictions in the society in which he lived.

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SOURCES CONSULTED Bennassar, Bartolomé. The Spanish Character: Attitudes and Mentalities from the Sixteenth to the Nineteenth Century. Translated by Benjamin Keen. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1975. Bowker, John, ed. The Oxford Dictionary of World Religions. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997. s.v. “Inquisition.” Cranston, Maurice. The Romantic Movement. Cambridge: Blackwell Publishers, 1994. Gies, David Thatcher. The Theatre in Nineteenth Century Spain. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994. Horner, Avril, ed. European Gothic: A Spirited Exchange 1760-1960. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2002. Latimer, Elizabeth Wormeley. Spain in the Nineteenth Century. 4th ed. Chicago: A.C. McClurg and Company, 1897. Londré, Felicia. World Theatre: From the Restoration to the Present. New York: Continuum, 1999. Mandel, Oscar, ed. The Theatre of Don Juan: A Collection of Plays and Views, 630-1963. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1963. McClelland, I.L. The Origins of the Romantic Movement in Spain: A Survey of Aesthetic Uncertainties in the Age of Reason. 2nd ed. Barnes & Noble Books: A Division of Harper and Rowe Publishers, 1975. McGuire, Elizabeth. A Study of the Writings of D. Mariano José de Larra 1809-1837. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1918. Mitchell, Timothy. Violence and Piety in Spanish Folklore. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1988. Murphy, Martin. Blanco White: Self-Banished Spaniard. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1989.

12 Peers, E. Allison. The Romantic Movement in Spain. Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 1968. Schurlknight, Donald E. Spanish Romanticism in Context: Of Subversion, Contradiction and Politics. New York: University Press of America, 1998. Shaw, Donald L. A Literary History of Spain: The Nineteenth Century. New York: Barnes and Noble, 1972. Ullman, Pierre L. Mariano de Larra and Spanish Political Rhetoric. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1971.