Ere long my river was a sea.
More high that sea shall rise, and shine
Far off, a prophet-beam of morn,
Because my doctrine is not mine,
But light of God for seers unborn.
LOPE DE VEGA.
A prolific playwright, a popular poet, a voluminous romance writer, an author whose fecundity is equalled only by the elder Dumas, the contemporary of Shakspere, the friend of Cervantes, the intimate and guide of Calderon, the founder of the Spanish national drama—Lope de Vega was all these, and yet today he is carefully forgotten. His biography even remains unwritten. The attempt, it is true, has been made, with more or less success, in England by Lord Holland, in America by Mr. Ticknor, and in France by M. Damas-Hinard. None is fully satisfactory; all three are too prejudiced, the first two against him, the last in his favor. Mr. Ticknor’s is the fairest and the ablest. But the space in a history of literature which can be assigned to any one author is necessarily too limited to permit the introduction of a full-length portrait; with a slight sketch, or a kit-cat at best, we must content ourselves. The articles in the various encyclopædias and biographical dictionaries are either scant or in great part taken from Lord Holland’s book. Much biographical material exists, scattered here and there, and needing only judicious gleaning. But a few months after his death La Fama Postuma, a eulogy containing many curious details of his manner of life, was published by his friend and follower, Montalvan, whom Valdivielso calls the “first-born of Lope de Vega’s genius.” The allusions to him in the works of his contemporaries are copious; but his bare biography can be condensed into a few lines.
Lope Felix de Vega Carpio was born at Madrid, November 25, 1562. He was a precocious child, reading Latin as well as Spanish at the age of five, and at eleven he wrote his first plays. Left alone in the world at the age of fourteen by the death of his father, also a poet, he travelled as far as Segovia with a school-fellow. Their money gave out, and when they attempted to sell a gold chain to pay their way back they were arrested. The corregidor before whom they were brought, seeing that they were but school-boys, kindly sent them back to Madrid in care of an alguacil. At fifteen Lope was a soldier warring in Portugal and Africa. At sixteen he was the page and secretary of Geronimo Manrique, Bishop of Avila, and also studied and took the degree of Bachelor at the University of Alcala. While in the bishop’s house he wrote a few eclogues and a pastoral comedy. Then he became the secretary of Antonio, the grandson of the great Duke of Alva; his Arcadia, written then, is more or less an account of the gallant adventures of his patron. Returning to the bishop, he was about to become a priest when he fell in love, and in 1584 he married Doña Isabella d’Urbina. Quarrelling with a hidalgo of little reputation, he was arrested, by the aid of Claudio Conde released from prison, and exiled; he lived two years in Valencia, and there he first regularly wrote for the stage. Shortly after his return to Madrid his wife died, and in conjugal despair he embarked on the famous Armada, finding time to write a poem, “The Beauty of Angelica,” a continuation of the Orlando Furioso, before the dispersion and destruction of the great fleet by Drake. After travelling in Italy he returned to Spain and became the secretary of the Marquis of Sarria. In 1597 he married Doña Juana de Guardio. For nearly ten years Lope de Vega seems to have been quietly happy, devoting himself to the care of his son Carlos, but in 1607 or 1608 both his wife and his son died, leaving him an infant daughter. During these years he had been writing steadily for the stage; in 1609 he delivered his Arte Nuevo de Hacer Comedias, and in the same year he became a priest. He was also a Familiar of the Inquisition—an honorary distinction, attesting the purity of his Catholic blood, and conferring the privilege of being called into the service of the institution. In 1625, according to Mr. Ticknor, “he entered the congregation of the native priesthood of Madrid, and was so faithful and exact in the performance of his duties that in 1628 he was elected to be its chief chaplain.” After working for the theatre for forty years, in 1630 he definitely renounced dramatic authorship. In 1628 the pope, Urban VIII., wrote him an autograph letter, conferring upon him the degree of Doctor of Divinity and naming him a Knight of the Order of Malta. For more than twenty-five years he daily devoted some portion of his time to the service of the church; on the title-page of his plays he calls himself Frey Lope de Vega, Familiar of the Inquisition, and the last important work he published was Dorotea, a long prose romance in dialogue, probably slightly autobiographical. Finally, on August 27, 1635, at the age of seventy-three, Lope Felix de Vega Carpio died. The funeral ceremonies, lasting nine days, were magnificent; the eulogistic poems published in Spain and Italy would fill several volumes; and “most solemn of all,” says Mr. Ticknor, generally disposed to underrate Lope de Vega’s popularity and ability, “was the mourning of the multitude, from whose dense mass audible sobs burst forth as his remains slowly descended from their sight into the house appointed for all living.”
For forty years the works of Lope de Vega had filled the theatres not only of Spain but of all Europe. There were but two dramatic companies in Madrid when he began to write; there were forty when he ceased. He composed over fifteen hundred dramas and an unknown number of lighter pieces, in addition to his non-theatrical works. He was as popular as he was prolific. Not only in Europe but in America were his plays performed. One of his comedies, the Fuerza Lastimosa, was even exhibited within the seraglio at Constantinople. His merit was so universally recognized that to call anything a Lope was to stamp it as being sterling; it was sufficient to say es de Lope. When the king and queen of Spain met him in the street they caused their carriage to stop, that they might better see the illustrious man. The Spanish dramatists of his own and the succeeding age did not hesitate to call him their master. Tirso de Molina, Alarcon, Calderon, and Guillen de Castro hail him as their chief. And he was as popular a man as he was an author; he was personally beloved by nearly all his contemporaries; he had few enemies and many friends. A gentleman by birth, breeding, and education, he had a kind word for all. He was handsome and agile. He wittily declared that he disliked only those who ask a person’s age without matrimonial intentions, those who take snuff in the presence of their superiors, those old men who dye their locks, those churchmen who consult gypsies, and those men who, though born of woman, yet speak ill of the sex.
Although it is as a playwright that he is best known, yet he was the author of many other works. He wrote two heroic, four mythological, four historical poems (among which was La Dragontea, devoted to the abuse of Sir Francis Drake), one burlesque (La Gatomachia, describing the loves and rivalries of two cats), many descriptive and didactic verses, and a multitude of sonnets and epistles. He was also the author of eight almost interminable prose novels. His plays, however, are the noblest monument of his genius, although he himself thought otherwise. He declared that his autos (a sort of revival of the mysteries and moralities of the middle ages) were his best works, and regretted that he had not devoted his whole life to religious poetry.