SOR JUANA INEZ DE LA CRUZ.
It would not be proper to dismiss from the list of Spanish-American dramatic writers Sor Juana Inez de la Cruz, although the subjects to which this pious woman yielded her inventive imagination were mainly or wholly religious. She wrote, be it remembered, in that remarkable seventeenth century when a muse of religion walked through the scenes of the stage as well as through the gardens of the convent. Then were the patriarchs and apostles, the prophets and saints, the chief personages of a peculiar drama; and events and circumstances of the divine tragedy inspired such compositions as the Loas and Autos. It is upon one of these latter compositions that her merit as a dramatic writer rests; and we are glad to confirm in great part an opinion of her genius hitherto expressed by us, by here recalling the judgment of that eminent European critic of Spanish literature, Bouterwek, the more especially as our own Spanish scholar, Ticknor, seems to have inflicted such ungracious disparagement upon the subject of our notice: "Much as Inez de la Cruz was deficient in real cultivation," says Bouterwek, "her productions are eminently superior to the ordinary standard of female poetry.... The poems of Inez de la Cruz breathe a sort of masculine spirit. This poetic nun possessed more fancy and wit than sentimental enthusiasm, and whenever she began to invent her creations were on a bold and great scale. Her poems are of very unequal merit, and are all deficient in critical cultivation. But in facility of invention and versification Inez de la Cruz was not inferior to Lope de Vega; and yet she by no means courted literary fame.... In her dramatic works the vigor of her imagination is particularly conspicuous. The collection of her poems contains no comedies properly so-called, but it comprises a series of boldly conceived preludes (loas) full of allegorical invention, and it concludes with a long allegorical auto, which is superior to any of the similar productions of Lope de Vega. It is entitled El Divino Narciso, a name by which the author designates the heavenly bridegroom.... It would be impossible to give a brief and at the same time intelligible sketch of this extraordinary drama. With regard to composition, it is very unequal; in some respects offending by its bad taste, and in others charming by its boldness. Many of its scenes are so beautifully and romantically constructed that the reader is compelled to render homage to the genius of the poetess, while at the same time he cannot but regret the pitch of extravagance to which ideas really poetic are carried. There is one peculiarly fine scene, in which human nature, in the shape of a nymph, seeks her beloved, the real Narcissus, or the Christian Saviour." The pastoral passage, which in our notice of the writings of Sor Juana we laid before our readers, would seem to justify the best praises of our literary historian, Bouterwek. Ticknor, on the other hand, speaks of her as a remarkable woman, and not as a remarkable poetess; and, upon the whole, our thanks for the appreciative reburnishing of the ancient fame of an American genius—which, had it shone in Massachusetts three hundred years ago, would be deemed a very rare jewel among Northern scholars—are due rather to the European Bouterwek than the American Ticknor. The latter observes that she was born at Guipuzcoa; her Mexican biographer says at San Miguel de Nepantla, not far from the city of Mexico, one of whose convents she seems to have directed latterly. Time, place, the inferior standard of feminine culture, and the prevalence of a false poetic school, may account for Sor Juana's defects; for the rest, the issue (a large one) is between Bouterwek and Ticknor.