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The Comedias of Diego Ximénez De Enciso
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 December 2020
Extract
It is usually a safe principle to abide by the judgment of time and leave a forgotten writer in the oblivion to which his nation consigns him. With the Spanish playwrights of the seventeenth century, however, the rule may be said to offer an exception by reason of the fact that the merciless excess of dramas forced into neglect, with what was mediocre, much that in itself was excellent and which might, under more favorable circumstances, have stood the test of time. The works of no one have suffered more in this respect than those of Ximénez de Enciso. Though he has from time to time been deemed worthy of honorable mention, it is not possible to say that he has ever been given the just measure of praise to which a closer view of what remains from his pen would entitle him. In his own day he enjoyed considerable fame, as the frequent mention of his achievement by contemporaries would go to show, but for the two and a half centuries which have passed since then, he has shared the fate of the majority of Spanish playwrights whose works have been consigned to an undeserved oblivion.
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- Research Article
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- Copyright © Modern Language Association of America, 1903
References
Note 1 in page 195 Libro xix.
Note 2 in page 195 La Filomena, Epístola viii.
Note 3 in page 195 Libro ii.
Note 4 in page 195 Capítulo iv.
Note 1 in page 196 Fernando de Vera, Panegírico por la Poesía., Montilla (1627).
Note 2 in page 196 Teatro de los Teatros de los pasados y presentes Siglos, mentioned in appendix to Guyangos' trans. of Ticknor's History of Spanish Lit., vol. ii.
Note 1 in page 197 Tomo I de las Obras del Señor Dr. Don Sebastian Francisco de Medrano. en Milán 1631.
Note 2 in page 197 Vol. ii, 3d American Edition, Boston, 1866 (2d Period, chs. xx and xxi).
Note 3 in page 197 Ticknor's error is due to the fact that he was guided by the twenty-eighth volume of the Colección de Comedias Nuevas Escogidas of which his library possesses two copies. In this volume El Príncipe Don Carlos is to be found with Juan Pérez de Montalbán given as its author. The confusion may also have arisen from the fact that Montalbán wrote a play with a very similar title, El Segundo Séneca de España y el Príncipe Don Carlos. In another volume (Comedias de Varios Autores, vol. 28, Huesca, 1634) El Príncipe Don Carlos is found properly given to Diego Ximénez de Anciso (sic). Ticknor has crossed out this name and written Montalbán over it.
Note 1 in page 198 See Convocación de las Cortes de Castilla y Juramento del Príncipe nuestro Señor Don Baltasar Carlos, primero deste nombre. Año de 1632, Madrid, 1632, by Ant. Hurtado de Mendoza.
Note 1 in page 199 These eleven plays are: 1. Los Celos en el Caballo; 2. El Encubierto; 3. Jupiter Vengado; 4. Juan Latino; 5. La Mayor Hazaña del Emperador Carlos Quinto; 6. El Príncipe Don Carlos; 7. Los Médicis de Florencia; 8. Quien calla otorga; 9. La Santa Margarita; 10 and 11. El Valiente Sevillano-Pedro Lobón (two parts). Mensonero Romanes in his list (vol. ii of Dramáticos Contemporáneos de Lope in the Biblioteca de Autores Españoles) mentions a twelfth, Engañar para reinar, which, however, belongs to Antonio Enríquez Gómez (? 1600-? 1660). Of these, Nos. 1, 4, 5, 6, 7, 9, 10, and 11 are in the National Library of Madrid, some being represented by more than one copy; Nos. 4, 5, 6, 7, 9, 10, and 11 are in the British Museum; Nos. 1, 2, 5, 6, 7, 9 are in the Ticknor Library in Boston; Nos. 4, 5, 6, 7 are in the Royal Library of Berlin; Nos. 5 and 7 are in the National Library of Paris; No. 6 is in the Royal Library of Munich; Nos. 4, 5, and 7 are in the Yale Library, and an old suelta of 6 is reported to be in the library of the University of Syracuse. This imperfect list will give an idea of the difficulty of getting at all old copies of existing plays by Enciso. It is to be hoped that some private libraries also will yield something on our subject.
Note 2 in page 199 Tirso de Molina's play, El Castigo del Penséque has a 2d part with the same title.
Note 3 in page 199 It is to be inferred that Barrera never saw a manuscript of Júpiter Vengado, since he says nothing about it. I have as yet found no clue to the whereabouts of the play, if it still exists.
Note 1 in page 204 The following parallels from La Vida es Sueño and El Príncipe Don Carlos will serve as examples of their occasional similarity.
Calderón.
1.
(Jornada I.)
Basilio: Su madre ....
.... vió que rompía
Sus entrañas atrevido
Un monstruo en forma de
hombre;
Y entre su sangre teñido
La daba muerte, naciendo
Víbora humana del siglo.
Llegó de su parto el día;
Y los presagios cumplidos, etc.
Enciso.
1.
(Jornada I.)
El Rey: Matasteis á vuestra madre
Corno vibora naciendo
Cuyo alevosa inocencia
Fué á España triste portento.
2.
(Jornada II.)
Sigismundo: También oíste decir
Que por un balcón, á quien
Me canse, sabré arrojar.
2*
(Jornada I.)
Don Carlos: Ni yo disimularé
Tanta osadía sin que
Te arroje por un balcón.
Vive Dios, que has de volar
Al foso.
3.
Sigismundo: Que un padre que contra mí
Tanto rigor sabe usar,
Que su condición ingrata
De su lado me desvía,
Como á una fiera me cría,
Y como á un monstruo me trata,
Y mi muerte solicita,
De poca importancia fué
Que los brazos no me dé,
Quando el ser de hombre me quita.
.............
3
3.
Don Carlos: ?Qué debo, qué debo á un padre
Que con tal rigor me trata,
Que fieramente me ríñe,
Que injustamente me agravia ?
Grande obligación por cierto
Es la forzosa crianza
De un hijo solo, heredero
De los Imperios de España.
..................
?Qué fiera, qué hombre no ama
Á sus hijos ? Quién les niega
Sigismundo: ?Dasme más de lo que es mío ?
Mi padre eres, y mi Rey;
Luego toda esta grandeza
Me da la naturaleza
Por derecho de su ley.
4.
Sigismundo: (having Rosaura in his power)
Hola, dejadnos solos, y esa puerta
Se cierre, y no entre nadie.
(va
se Clarín y
los criados)
Rosaura: Yo soy muerta.
5.
Clotaldo: ....
Y no, por verte ya de todos dueño,
Don Carlos: Estado, doctrina y casa?
................
Si vivo triste, si estoy
Desabrido, si me cansa
Todo, vuestra Majestad,
Siendo mi padre, es la causa.
4*
Don Carlos: (having Violante in his power)
Salios todos allá fuera.
(vanse los criados)
.....
Qué importa si á tu pesar
Sabré tu fuga estorbar
Para poderte rendir ?
Violante: ? Con qué habéis de conseguir
Vuestro intento ?
Don Carlos: Con cerrar
La puerta al cuarto.
(cierra la puerta)
Violante:Ay, infelice! ?Qué haré ?
5.
(Jornada III.)
Duque de Alba: . . . .
Si me le manda, he de ir yo.
Clotaldo: Seas cruel, porque quizá es un sueño.
Sigismundo: A rabia me provocas,
Quando la luz del desengaño tocas.
Veré, dándote muerte,
Si es sueño ó si es verdad.
(al ir a sacar la daga se la detiene Clotaldo, y se pone de rodillas.)
Clotaldo: Yo desta suerte
Librar mi vida espero.
Don Carlos: Mi gusto también es ley,
Y pues el vuestro se arroja
Contra el mío, yo haré así,
Que no vais.
(saca la daga el Príncipe y al tenerle el Duque el brazo, se le cae.)
Duque: Pobre de mí,
Si vuestra Alteza se enoja !
Passages 2* and 4* under Enciso are taken from the version published in 1773. Their similarity, however, to the parallels in Calderón again lead one to believe that this version existed before 1634 and that Calderón must have seen it either in manuscript or on the stage. It is difficult to understand how its author should have imitated Calderón, rather than the other way about. In the first place, these scenes belong organically to the plot of El Príncipe Don Carlos, as taken partly from Cabrera, partly from traditions about the Prince's actions current in Enciso's day, and La Vida es Sueño would have to be dragged in to suppose that it served as a model. Second, since parallels exist between La Vida es Sueño and parts common to both versions of El Príncipe Don Carlos (Nos. 1, 3, and 5 of above examples), and since in these parallels Enciso was the first on the ground, i. e., before 1633, it seems reasonable to think that in the other parallels, also, the precedence belongs to him.
Note 1 in page 210 La Vida es Sueño, ii, 2.
Note 2 in page 210 Act I, 381.
Note 3 in page 210 See Tirso's Del Enemigo el primer Consejo, i, 81.