MONTIANO’S TRAGEDIES IN THE FRENCH STYLE.
Agustin de Montiano y Luyando, who was counsellor of state, director of the academy of history, and a member of the Spanish academy, undertook to introduce regular tragedy on the Spanish stage according to Luzan’s principles. With this view he wrote two tragedies, the one entitled Virginia, and the other Ataulpho, in which, with the exception of the rhymeless iambics, which he substituted for the French Alexandrines, he has most anxiously endeavoured to fulfil all the conditions required by French criticism.[597] Both these tragedies are remarkable for pure and correct language; for the cautious avoidance of false metaphor; and for a certain natural style of expression, which is sometimes wanting even in the dramas of Corneille and Racine. They are, however, formed on the French model with such scrupulous nicety that they might be mistaken for translations.[598] It is scarcely necessary to mention, that in these tragedies the Aristotelian unities are rigidly observed, and that in the Virginia the father does not stab his daughter on the stage.
To the play of Virginia which was published in 1750, some years before Ataulpho, Montiano annexed a historical critical treatise on Spanish tragedy.[599] Patriotism had certainly some share in this treatise; for in the first place, Montiano wished historically to defend his countrymen against the reproach that no Spanish tragedy had ever been written; and secondly, he wished in his Virginia to furnish the first experiment of a Spanish tragedy, without violation of dramatic rules, though he did not pretend to set up that specimen as a model. He states, with all due modesty, that his work cost him much labour, and expresses a hope that his countrymen will be induced to imitate his example, to disregard the approbation of the ignorant multitude, and to strive to do better than he had done.[600] In a preface to his tragedy of Ataulpho he enlarges on the same theme.