The other, a person of more consequence in the history of the Spanish drama, is Bartolomé de Torres Naharro, born at Torres, near Badajoz, on the borders of Portugal, who, after he had been for some time a captive in Algiers, was redeemed, and visited Rome, hoping to find favor at the court of Leo the Tenth. This must have been after 1513, and was, of course, at the time when Juan de la Enzina resided there. But Naharro, by a satire against the vices of the court, made himself obnoxious at Rome, and fled to Naples, where he lived for some time under the protection of the noble-minded Fabricio Colonna, and where, at last, we lose sight of him. He died in poverty.[466]
His works, first published by himself at Naples in 1517, and dedicated to a noble Spaniard, Don Fernando Davalos, a lover of letters,[467] who had married Victoria Colonna, the poetess, are entitled “Propaladia,” or “The Firstlings of his Genius.”[468] They consist of satires, epistles, ballads, a Lamentation for King Ferdinand, who died in 1516, and some other miscellaneous poetry; but chiefly of eight plays, which he calls “Comedias,” and which fill almost the whole volume.[469] He was well situated for making an attempt to advance the drama, and partly succeeded in it. There was, at the time he wrote, a great literary movement in Italy, especially at the court of Rome. The representations of plays, he tells us, were much resorted to,[470] and, though he may not have known it, Trissino had, in 1515, written the first regular tragedy in the Italian language, and thus given an impulse to dramatic literature, which it never afterwards entirely lost.[471]
The eight plays of Naharro, however, do not afford much proof of a familiarity with antiquity, or of a desire to follow ancient rules or examples; but their author gives us a little theory of his own upon the subject of the drama, which is not without good sense. Horace, he says, requires five acts to a play, and he thinks this reasonable; though he looks upon the pauses they make rather as convenient resting-places than any thing else, and calls them, not acts, but “Jornadas,” or days.[472] As to the number of persons, he would have not less than six, nor more than twelve; and as to that sense of propriety which refuses to introduce materials into the subject that do not belong to it, or to permit the characters to talk and act inconsistently, he holds it to be as indispensable as the rudder to a ship. This is all very well.
Besides this, his plays are all in verse, and all open with a sort of prologue, which he calls “Introyto,” generally written in a rustic and amusing style, asking the favor and attention of the audience, and giving hints concerning the subject of the piece that is to follow.
But when we come to the dramas themselves, though we find a decided advance, in some respects, beyond any thing that had preceded them, in others we find great rudeness and extravagance. Their subjects are very various. One of them, the “Soldadesca,” is on the Papal recruiting service at Rome. Another, the “Tinelaria,” or Servants’ Dining-Hall, is on such riots as were likely to happen in the disorderly service of a cardinal’s household; full of revelry and low life. Another, “La Jacinta,” gives us the story of a lady who lives at her castle on the road to Rome, where she violently detains sundry passengers and chooses a husband among them. And of two others, one is on the adventures of a disguised prince, who comes to the court of a fabulous king of Leon, and wins his daughter after the fashion of the old romances of chivalry;[473] and the other on the adventures of a child stolen in infancy, which involve disguises in more humble life.[474]
How various were the modes in which these subjects were thrown into action and verse, and, indeed, how different was the character of his different dramas, may be best understood by a somewhat ampler notice of the two not yet mentioned.
The first of these, the “Trofea,” is in honor of King Manuel of Portugal, and the discoveries and conquests that were made in India and Africa, under his auspices; but it is very meagre and poor. After the prologue, which fills above three hundred verses, Fame enters in the first act and announces, that the great king has, in his most holy wars, gained more lands than are described by Ptolemy; whereupon Ptolemy appears instantly, by especial permission of Pluto, from the regions of torment, and denies the fact; but, after a discussion, is compelled to admit it, though with a saving clause for his own honor. In the second act, two shepherds come upon the stage to sweep it for the king’s appearance. They make themselves quite merry, at first, with the splendor about them, and one of them sits on the throne, and imitates grotesquely the curate of his village; but they soon quarrel, and continue in bad humor, till a royal page interferes and compels them to go on and arrange the apartment. The whole of the third act is taken up with the single speech of an interpreter, bringing in twenty Eastern and African kings who are unable to speak for themselves, but avow, through his very tedious harangue, their allegiance to the crown of Portugal; to all which the king makes no word of reply. The next act is absurdly filled with a royal reception of four shepherds, who bring him presents of a fox, a lamb, an eagle, and a cock, which they explain with some humor and abundance of allegory; but to all which he makes as little reply as he did to the proffered fealty of the twenty heathen kings. In the fifth and last act, Apollo gives verses, in praise of the king, queen, and prince, to Fame, who distributes copies to the audience; but, refusing them to one of the shepherds, has a riotous dispute with him. The shepherd tauntingly offers Fame to spread the praises of King Manuel through the world as well as she does, if she will but lend him her wings. The goddess consents. He puts them on and attempts to fly, but falls headlong on the stage, with which poor practical jest and a villancico the piece ends.
The other drama, called “Hymenea,” is better, and gives intimations of what became later the foundations of the national theatre. Its “Introyto,” or prologue, is coarse, but not without wit, especially in those parts which, according to the peculiar toleration of the times, were allowed to make free with religion, if they but showed sufficient reverence for the Church. The story is entirely invented, and may be supposed to have passed in any city of Spain. The scene opens in front of the house of Febea, the heroine, before daylight, where Hymeneo, the hero, after making known his love for the lady, arranges with his two servants to give her a serenade the next night. When he is gone, the servants discuss their own position, and Boreas, one of them, avows his desperate love for Doresta, the heroine’s maid; a passion which, through the rest of the piece, becomes the running caricature of his master’s. But at this moment the Marquis, a brother of Febea, comes with his servants into the street, and, by the escape of the others, who fly immediately, has little doubt that there has been love-making about the house, and goes away determined to watch more carefully. Thus ends the first act, which might furnish materials for many a Spanish comedy of the seventeenth century.
In the second act, Hymeneo enters with his servants and musicians, and they sing a cancion which reminds us of the sonnet in Molière’s “Misantrope,” and a villancico which is but little better. Febea then appears in the balcony, and after a conversation, which, for its substance and often for its graceful manner, might have been in Calderon’s “Dar la Vida por su Dama,” she promises to receive her lover the next night. When she is gone, the servants and the master confer a little together, the master showing himself very generous in his happiness; but they all escape at the approach of the Marquis, whose suspicions are thus fully confirmed, and who is with difficulty restrained by his page from attacking the offenders at once.
The next act is devoted entirely to the loves of the servants. It is amusing, from its caricature of the troubles and trials of their masters, but does not advance the action at all, The fourth, however, brings the hero and lover into the lady’s house, leaving his attendants in the street, who confess their cowardice to one another, and agree to run away, if the Marquis appears. This happens immediately. They escape, but leave a cloak, which betrays who they are, and the Marquis remains undisputed master of the ground at the end of the act.