First of all, a brief disclaimer. There are a number of things about which I can claim to be moderately knowledgeable; unfortunately, Spanish language and literature are not two of them. So everything I say here must be taken with that caveat. I wish it were not so; I believe the theatre of the Golden Age deserves a more knowledgeable translator than I am, certainly one with greater fluency than I have in either classical or modern Spanish. Nonetheless, I have undertaken to translate plays from this period, not so much out of a confidence in my own abilities, as out of a recognition that almost no one else was doing what cried out to be done: to offer playable English scripts to American theatres for production. Yet the question remains: who am I to be doing this? And this brings me to the two areas where I am knowledgeable, which I hope will mitigate, though never entirely excuse, my obvious weaknesses.

As an English professor, specializing in Shakespeare and dramatic literature, I am fairly knowledgeable about the general state and conventions of sixteenth- and seventeenth-century theatre – in the British Isles and elsewhere. With a second specialization in language and rhetoric, I am fairly knowledgeable about early modern syntax and early modern rhetorical principles and practices, which were fairly standard across the continent in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. And with a third specialization in prosody, I have a pretty good grasp of English verse form, especially of dramatic verse form, which is a narrower and very specific type of poetry.

Second, as an actor, playwright, and director, I have a pretty good understanding of characterization (especially as it is suggested by language); of the practical dynamics of dramatic structure (basically, “actability” – what makes a play actually work or not work on stage); and of, for lack of a better word, “speakability” (what kind of stage language meets the sometimes contrary demands of stylishness and naturalness that classical verse plays for modern audiences often make on the actors).