20th Century Spanish Theater: From Benavente to Lorca
Early 20th Century Spanish Theater
Social Context and Limitations
At the dawn of the 20th century, Spanish theater faced constraints due to its bourgeois audience, largely uninterested in social issues or innovative styles. This audience sought entertainment that mirrored their own perspectives, neglecting the realities of marginalized communities. This preference contributed to a stagnant theatrical landscape, resistant to the renewal movements sweeping Europe and the world. Existing theatrical structures further reinforced these limitations, hindering artistic development.
Late 19th Century Background
Romantic drama had gradually evolved into a more balanced and reflective form, culminating in high comedy. This style emphasized contemporary settings, realistic portrayals of the time, and a didactic approach that explored moral dilemmas. While retaining some Romantic elements like heightened emotions and occasional sentimentality, high comedy represented a shift away from melodrama. Playwrights like Adelardo López de Ayala and Manuel Tamayo y Baus contributed to this trend. However, this balance was disrupted by the resurgence of neo-Romanticism with José Echegaray, where dramatic gestures overshadowed realism. The late 19th century witnessed attempts to break free from this melodramatic legacy, incorporating realistic settings, conversational language, and socially relevant themes. Jacinto Benavente would become a key figure in shaping this new theatrical direction.
Commercial vs. Literary Theater
While literary theater aspired to high artistic standards, commercial theater catered to prevailing audience tastes, often at the expense of quality. Jacinto Benavente’s career exemplifies this tension. After the critical and commercial failure of “The Alien Nest,” which explored the social position of middle-class women of color, Benavente shifted towards writing plays that appealed to the broader public. “The Food of Beasts” marked his first major success, after which he largely focused on replicating successful formulas. His plays typically revolved around personal or social conflicts, featuring elegant and witty dialogue. His body of work encompasses bourgeois comedies and rural dramas.
Comedies of Manners and Poetic Drama
Alongside Benavente’s work, other theatrical trends emerged. The “comedy of manners” depicted the picturesque environments and characters of specific regions, often with humorous language. Carlos Arniches excelled in this genre, portraying the customs of Madrid’s working-class neighborhoods in plays like “The Saint of Isidro.” From 1916, he pioneered the “grotesque tragicomedy,” featuring exaggerated characters and social critique, as seen in “Miss de Trevélez.” The Álvarez Quintero brothers, Serafín and Joaquín, collaborated on numerous sketches and comedies set in an idealized Andalusia, such as “Hollyhock.” Poetic drama, influenced by modernism, explored historical themes with a conservative ideology, often evoking a nostalgic longing for the past. Eduardo Marquina exemplified this style with works like “In Flanders the Sun Has Set.” The Generation of ’98, including Unamuno, Azorín, and Jacinto Grau, also contributed to theater, often focusing on traditional themes in poetic prose, as in Grau’s “The Lord of Pygmalion.”
The Theater of Valle-Inclán
A Unique Vision
Valle-Inclán’s dramatic work stands apart from his contemporaries. Though his plays were often relegated to the realm of closet drama during his time, he is now recognized as a visionary. His originality, radical approach, rich language, and distinct themes set him apart. His life, filled with anecdotes and self-crafted legends, adds to his mystique.
Development and the Esperpento
While associated with the Generation of ’98, Valle-Inclán’s ideology and aesthetics diverged significantly. His critique of society and political culture was far more radical. His artistic evolution led him from decadent modernism to the creation of a unique genre: the esperpento. Beginning with modernist influences, he experimented with various styles before arriving at this defining form.
The Esperpento: A Grotesque Mirror
Around 1920, with the first version of “Bohemian Lights,” Valle-Inclán solidified the esperpento. This genre systematically distorts characters and values, offering a scathing critique of Spanish society. It presents a grotesque reflection of an already distorted reality, revealing the true face of Spanish life. Characters become puppets in a nightmarish world, yet the author occasionally displays affection towards them. The esperpento is characterized by the contrast between grotesque and painful, tragic and comic, and a rich, stylized language drawing from various registers. The stage itself becomes a literary element, with frequent changes in space and time.
Post-Civil War Theater
New Voices and Directions
The Spanish Civil War and its aftermath significantly impacted the theatrical landscape. Alejandro Casona gained recognition with “Our Natasha” in 1936. His later works, often premiered in exile, blended reality and fantasy with a poetic language. Max Aub’s diverse theatrical output ranged from avant-garde to realistic works.
The Theater of Federico García Lorca
Poetry in Motion
While Lorca’s interest in theater began early, his most significant dramatic works emerged in his later years. His plays are deeply rooted in poetry, both in their themes and language. The central conflict in many of his plays revolves around the individual’s struggle against authority, where desire, love, and freedom clash with tradition and social conventions. Female protagonists often take center stage, facing the threat of frustration.
Lorca’s Dramatic Spectrum
Lorca’s early attempt, “The Butterfly’s Evil Spell,” was unsuccessful, yet it foreshadowed themes that would reappear in later works: love, death, desire, and illusion. His farces, such as “The Tragicomedy of Don Cristobal and Doña Rosita” and “The Shoemaker’s Prodigious Wife,” use humor to explore darker themes. “Mariana Pineda” marked his first foray into lyrical drama, recounting the story of a heroine executed for embroidering a Republican flag. Surreal and politically engaged pieces like “The Public” and “Thus Five Years Pass” showcase Lorca’s experimentation with form and his exploration of taboo subjects. His unfinished “Untitled Play” prefigures the anxieties of the impending Civil War.
Rural Trilogy
is called “Blood Wedding”, “barren” and “house of dawn seigneur. The three have common features: the sexual nature of the problems dealt with women as protagonists, migration in the Andalusian countryside and tragic consequences. Blood Wedding is preparing a wedding between the bride and groom. But when the union will take place, is Leonardo, the bride’s old flame and they flee. The groom begins his persecution and the final battle, stabbed-die. The union of realism and poetry, prose and verse, dense and dramatic climate make it a memorable work. Yerma is the tragedy of the barren woman. Verma wants to be mother of his children do not get desperate and start blaming her husband and their fertility.In its quest to become pregnant, goes pilgrimages ambushed miracle. During their attempts to shine, kill her husband, losses and definitely hope to be a mother. The House of Bernarda Alba is a breathtaking drama intense. Bernard Alva, on the death of her second husband, spotless eight years of her five daughters, who are virtually buried alive. But the instincts emerge and when Peter agrees with anguish, the oldest daughter, is unleashed passions struggle between Adela and martyrdom, leading to a tragic end. The House of Bernarda Alba is the top drama of Lorca, which come to his great obsessions with flow and in which language becomes poetic accents difficult to overcome.
Characters: visible, invisible, mentioned. Invisible characters are mentioned by the characters visible. They have no dramatic weight but the characters are used to modify its behavior or express their opinion. People who pay their own names which were descriptive or generic name. In the case of the characters with their own name repeatedly pointed criticism of the symbolic value and characterized by many names.
Characterization procedures: indirect (through dialogue and the view of other characters) by its self, by their actions and their words, their stage movements for the objects it owns. The play takes place entirely inside the house of Bernarda Alba. The information on the site of the house in which each argument is developed at the beginning telling us about acts dimensions.
Literary realism: in the strict sense is not realistic in many exaggerations: the grief, the power of / Pepe differences between anxiety and age. Honesty is a reality.
Language of work: dimensions: time-space information, clothing and objects bearing the characters. Gestures and movements. Entering and leaving scene, tone of voice communication intention. They are very abundant. Characters: asides (communication mode in which a character spoke the words with the intention that they are not perceived by peer) has grown from the work of the maids talking about Berlanga. Monologues (modified form of the part, a character uttered speech to express his feelings for his opinion on the facts determined). Dialogues: we classify them into three groups according to their content. Panel to: informative dialogues: in the anecdotal stories that are developed or discharged opinions about characters and situations. Group dialogues in which is an indication of the space or time. Action Groups dialogues in which the characters face positions that allow the progress of dramatic action. The most important note of the talks is the use of social traits with traits of barbarism point there, two earthquakes, examples of rural lexicon, popular sayings, some phrase, different treatment formulations, direct allusions, phrases with double meanings … should be emphasized in the SIP settings literary theft, civilians, symbols … the language is written in prose prepare four versions found in the verse. In the event one in the litany that do nothing and pray that accompany women’s duet in the song of the senators, in the third act when the reciting a popular saying, the last occasion in which he sings with Maria Josefa sheep lullaby arms.