It has been viewed as showing the attempt of man to hide from his fears. It has been viewed as embodying the constant impulse of man’s body, as Faust represents the tireless impulse of man’s mind. The figure of Don Juan lends itself to many meanings (Parker 19). She can make an angel of one who was a devil. Her love has transformed me into a new man it has renewed my whole being. That which judges and bishops could not bring me to with threats of jail and sermons was accomplished by her purity. Don Gonzalo, what I adore in Dona Ines is her goodness. I didn’t love her beauty nor did I worship her charms. I’m convinced that Heaven has granted her to me to turn my steps in the paths of righteousness. In the play Don Juan is longing for his perfect love is linked, or even equated, with his quest to partake of the grace of God. Don Juan displays a suicidal courage, as if actually courting death. Nor have I bothered to distinguish between the religious and the secular.”ĭon Juan defies death because his Tantalic love makes him seek the annihilation of his temporal existence in order to reunite with the absolute, which contains in its engulfing unity his perfect beloved. I descended to humble cabins, I rose to palaces, I climbed the walls of cloisters and everywhere I left a bitter memory of myself, I recognized the sacredness of nothing and my audacity respected not a single place or occasion. From the haughty princess to the wench who fishes in a miserable boat. Moreover, his entire life, like carnival, knows no boundaries, respects no hierarchies: “My love has spanned the whole of our social scale. 3), seems quite at home in this world of carnival. When the curtain rises, people in masks, students and townspeople are seen passing by.” The setting is appropriate in fact, don Juan, “the first hero of modernity” ( Serres 1982, p. When the curtain goes up on to the set of Zorrilla’s Don Juan Tenorio, the spectator immediately enters the leveled world of carnival: “Don Juan, wearing a mask, sits at a table writing.
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The fact is that Zorrilla’s work is full of the romance, the cheap spiritual flights, the sentimentalities, and the scenic crowding that all but killed the theatre in the nineteenth century. The protagonist of Zorrilla’s drama is a charismatic character taken from Spanish history, and the author places him in the center of a plot full of action. This character embodies justice and always prevails over the villains. In his drama, there is a mysterious character, intelligent and powerful, who is in possession of a secret that will change the course of events. He also complicated his plot with elements of intrigue that maintain suspense until the end of each play. Like other contemporary authors of historical plays, Zorrilla modified history. In Don Juan Tenorio he carried on the national tradition. Zorrilla was an innovator of the historical drama that flourished in the 1840s (Mandrell 56). The melodious fluidity of the rich verse, the liveliness of the action, the brilliancy of the spectacle, and the impact of the plot made Don Juan Tenorio the greatest creation of the Spanish Romantic theater. The supernatural intervention of Don Gonzalo and Doña Inés’s offer to God to make her salvation contingent upon that of Don Juan, lack any religious meaning, belonging to the realm of fantasy. However, the principal theme of the play is Zorrilla’s main innovation: the redeeming power of pure love, a purpose that voids the Counter-Reformation character of Tirso’s play (Mazzeo 76).ĭon Juan Tenorio is a Romantic drama devoid of any theological, moralizing, or didactic value. The servant Ciutti is not his master’s conscience, like Tirso’s Catalinón, but rather the executor of his wishes. He added many new situations, created the character don Luis Mejia, Don Juan’s antagonist, and introduced Brígida, who combines the role of “graciosa” with that of go-between in the tradition of Celestina. Regardless of which sources might have inspired him, Zorrilla maintained the setting and the characters created by Tirso.
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