Los Amantes de Teruel / Drama en cuatro actos en verso y prosa

by Juan Eugenio Hartzenbusch

[Footnote 5: In order that the student may discover for himself the essential differences between the two schools of drama, it is recommended that he read a classical play such as Moratin's El Sí de las Niñas before reading Los Amantes de Teruel. In comparing the two plays he should bear in mind that, for the reason that they are both artistic masterpieces, they avoid the extremes of Classicism and Romanticism, and that they do not illustrate entirely the opposite characteristics of the less artistic examples of the two kinds of drama.]

#VII. Romanticism in Los Amantes de Teruel.# That the appeal is mainly to the emotions and imagination is quite evident. The plot is based on a legend that owes its chief interest to the unusual and even improbable ending; and the exceptional and improbable, if they are to be effectively treated in literature, must appeal to the imagination, must so stir the sentiments of the reader or hearer that the reasoning faculty may be kept from becoming too active. Not only is the dénouement itself improbable; the somewhat melodramatic figure of Zulima and the important part she plays in keeping apart the lovers until it is too late, would hardly be convincing if the main appeal of the play were to the intellect. These improbabilities are willingly ignored by the reader or spectator as he allows himself to be carried along in the current of passion to the final scene of deep emotion and intense pathos. Melodious verse and poetic imagery help to make effective this emotional appeal.

The spiritual appeal of the play is apparent. To Marsilla and Isabel love is so spiritualized that materialism can find in it no place. Their love for each other is the "encarnación del cariño anticipado al nacer," life means for them "seguir con el cuerpo amando, como el espíritu amó." Love is life itself; and when no longer permitted to love each other in this life for the reason that Isabel, believing her lover to be dead and wishing to sacrifice herself in order that her mother's good name may be preserved, has become the wife of Rodrigo de Azagra, they willingly return to the spiritual world from which together they had come into the world of materiality.

The dramatization of a medieval legend is typical of the newly awakened interest in the Middle Ages. Five years before the beginning of the supposed action of the play, shortly after Marsilla had left home to gain name and fortune in the wars against the infidels, was fought at Navas de Tolosa one of the most decisive battles between Christianity and Mohammedanism. The year after his departure from Teruel there ascended the throne of Aragón the boy that was to be known to history as Jaime el Conquistador because of his reconquest of southeastern Spain for Christianity. In the lull that preceded the approaching storm the Christians and Moslems in the eastern part of the peninsula were at peace, so that in the play they mingle freely, treating each other with the chivalrous respect that was characteristic of the Middle Ages. The numerous references to contemporary historic personages and events and the careful attention to local color bring vividly before us the life of that part of Aragón recently recovered from the Moors. The dénouement is made less improbable by placing the action of the play in that age of deep convictions, exalted idealism, chivalrous customs, and in that part of Spain where tenacity of purpose has always been regarded as a characteristic trait.

Picturesqueness, in its literary sense is not very apparent in the play as we now have it. In the first version there were examples of striking contrasts, a mingling of the tragic and comic, the noble and base, but these were toned down or eliminated by the author in his revisions of the play. For an example of exaggerated picturesqueness, with its violent contrasts, mingling of the sublime and vulgar, the grotesque and beautiful, the student is referred to Don Álvaro.

The classical conventionality that each kind of literature should have its prescribed form and that the various literary genres should be kept apart was disregarded by Hartzenbusch. In this play we see a mingling of scenes in prose with those in verse, we find the versification varied according to the nature of the scenes, a mingling of dramatic dialogue and lyrical expression of sentiment and passion. The action of the play in its first form was impeded by the excessive lyricism of some of the scenes; although notably reduced, this lyric element is still quite apparent in the scene between Marsilla and Zulima in the first act, for example; or between Marsilla and Isabel in the last. In the first version Mari-Gómez, later changed to Teresa with the suppression of most of her garrulity, was made to serve as a graciosa and thus relieve the tenseness of the serious scenes.

As to the three dramatic unities so dear to the Classicists, those of time and place are disregarded. The action shifts from Valencia to Teruel; the time occupied covers the last six days of the plazo given Marsilla in which to gain name and fortune and return home to claim Isabel for wife. The unity of action, the one essential unity in any work of art, is carefully preserved. In the first version could be seen something of the Romantic tendency to complicate the plot by the introduction of an excessive number of characters and needless episodes, but in its final form the plot is simple and nothing is permitted to interfere with its dramatic development.

In the first version there was also some tendency to abuse the new freedom from conventionality in language, a tendency to seek out unusual words and phrases for the sake of their picturesqueness, rather than for their artistic appropriateness. In the polishing and toning-down process, such words and phrases were eliminated, so that the play in its final form serves as a good illustration of the permanent enrichment of the literary language by the Romanticists. Likewise, in its versification, it offers a good example of the metrical variety found in the Spanish dramatists of the Golden Age and revived by the Romanticists.

#VIII. Versification.# Only the fundamental principles of Spanish versification will be noted here. For a more adequate treatment the student is referred to such works as Andrés Bello's Ortología y métrica (Vol. IV of Obras completas, Madrid, 1890), or the Prosodia castellana y versificación of E. Benot; or to the more easily accessible notes on Spanish versification in Hills and Morley's Modern Spanish Lyrics or Ford's Spanish Anthology.

Some knowledge of two of the essential differences between Spanish and English versification is needed for the appreciation of the poetry of this play. Whereas in English poetry the number of feet to the line is essential, in Spanish the basis of meter is the number of syllables; moreover, in syllable-counting there are certain rules (too complicated to be given here) regarding the treatment of contiguous vowels as one syllable or more than one. Another difference that should be noted is that in Spanish poetry there are two kinds of rime, consonantal rime and assonance. Consonantal rime is the same as that used in English poetry, identity of the last stressed vowel sound as well as all following vowel or consonant sounds in two or more verses; as for example, in lines 127-130, Act I, clemencia, Valencia: favor, mejor. Assonance is identity in a series of verses of the last stressed vowel and of a following unstressed vowel, if there be one, but not of a consonant; in other words, assonance is the correspondence of the vowels, but not of the consonants, in the riming syllables. Thus, in the first 110 lines of the play, all the even verses have the same vowel in the last stressed syllables: volver, administré, fiel, pie, Adel, partiré, el, rey, etc. Only the strong vowel in a diphthong is recognized, so that in these 110 lines the assonance of the alternate verses is in e. In the first 148 lines of Act IV all the even verses have one and the same vowel in the last accented syllable and one and the same vowel in the unaccented syllable: pueblo, bandoleros, prenderlos, tiempo, vinieron, provecho, etc. The assonance is, therefore, é-o.