Guillén de Castro
(Guillén de Castro y Bellvís; Valencia, 1569-Madrid, 1631) Spanish playwright.From an illustrious family, in 1606 he went to Italy as governor of Scigliano, and returned to Valencia around 1609, to settle shortly after in Madrid, under the orders of the eldest son of the Duke of Osuna.He composed a great variety of theatrical works, always in the wake of Lope de Vega, whom he met and admired.His most famous drama is Las mocedades del Cid , which Corneille would later adapt.Among the rest of his production, historical dramas such as The Most Improper Executioner and Las Hazañas del Cid , swashbuckling works, such as The Badly Married of Valencia , and mythological pieces, such as Progne and Filomena and The loves of Dido and Aeneas .Among his comedies it is worth highlighting The perfect gentleman .
Guillén de Castro
The scarce biographical data that are had about His childhood and youth contrast with more abundant information from the 1590s, when, in addition to appearing at various public festivals, he entered the famous Academy of the Nocturns, of which he will be one of its best supporters from his first poetic reading in 1592.He served as captain of the coast cavalry and, in 1595, he married the Marquesa Girón de Rebolledo, with whom he will have a daughter, who died at an early age, and of whom he would be a widow shortly after, before the end of the century.
In 1601 he was already attorney general of the Duke of Gandía, Carlos de Borja, although this activity did not prevent him from participating in some poetic jousts, such as the one dedicated to San Raimundo de Peñafort in 1602.Five years later he traveled to Italy, where he was appointed Governor of Scigliano in the service of the Viceroy of Naples, the Count of Benavente.In 1608 two of his dramas were published ( The silly gentleman and Constant love ) in an anthology of Valencian authors.
Back in Valencia in 1609, he continued the writing of his theatrical work and founded (around 1616) a new academy with the name of Los montañeses del Parnaso, of which he will be president.At the beginning of 1619 he settled in Madrid, under the protection of the Duke of Osuna, a time in which both his fame as a playwright and poet and his financial troubles were consolidated, which only experienced temporary stability after his wedding with Angela Salgado, lady of the Duchess of Osuna, celebrated in 1626.She died in poverty, as evidenced by some documents.
Guillen de Castro's literary career must be analyzed, first of all, in the context of Valencian theater, since that this city was one of the most fruitful theatrical centers of that historical moment, as a logical consequence of its social and commercial power.Furthermore, and secondly, Castro's work exemplifies in a special way the point of union between the Renaissance heritage and the new style promoted by Lope de Vega.There seems to be no doubt that the friendship between the two authors, established after Lope's two stays in Valencia, was not limited to simple mutual praise (Lope composed the sonnet "Dido y Eneas" in his honor and dedicated Las almenas de Toro ; Guillen de Castro dedicated to Marcela, Lope's daughter, the First part of his comedies ).
However, Castro's production was not based exclusively on the lopesco flow, but will be already in full development when it adopts some of its most popular characteristics and achievements, perhaps this being the reason that caused the admiration in numerous authors, such as Miguel de Cervantes (who praised him in the prologue to his Comedies and in the Journey of Parnassus ) and Baltasar Gracián (in the Arte of ingenuity ).
Guillen de Castro's theatrical production has not yet been able to be completely chronologically fixed (although the impressions of the two parts of his comedies, in 1618 and 1625, have provided textual aspects).Criticism is also divided in its classification, because together with those who prefer a temporal evolution in three stages (the localist, that of the first lopesca influences and that of consolidation), there are others who opt for thematic analysis, and classify their works in traditional pieces (such as Los malcasados de Valencia ), politics ( Constant love ), Cervantes ( Don Quixote de la Mancha ), historical ( The youth of the Cid ), legendary ( Count Alarcos ), classic ( Dido and Eneas ) or mythological ( Progne and Filomena ), thus reaching some thirty titles.
In general, Guillén de Castro's theater is characterized by its sober technique and skillful versification, always at the service of themes dominated by psychological drama and emotional complexity.The main characteristics of this production, in addition to the thematic variety and the frequency of certain situations (the tyrant king, the adverse marriage, the peculiarity of the "funny" and the "cute" or the strength of honor and friendship), make Guillen de Castro is one of the most important figures of the Golden Age, although the diffusion and perfection of some work (especially of Las mocedades del Cid , inspiring of Le Cid by Pierre Corneille) has eclipsed the rest of his theater.
The two works that Guillén de Castro dedicated to the figure of the Cid, Las mocedades del Cid and Las hazañas del Cid (1618), are directly inspired by the ballads.Altogether they are somewhat motley and confusing, but the first, especially, is considered one of the most vigorous pieces of Spanish epic theater.In Las mocedades del Cid , in three acts and in verse, Rodrigo Díaz de Vivar, loved by the princess Doña Urraca and by Doña Jimena, still a girl, is knighted by the king, but luck let you use your sword very soon.Count Lozano seriously offends Rodrigo's father, Diego Laínez, and young Rodrigo, although he loves Jimena, the count's daughter, defies and kills him.
Jimena, obeying filial love, goes to ask the king for justice against the "beloved enemy." The king cannot make up his mind and Rodrigo, to cut his losses, launches with five hundred vassals into the field in search of warlike enterprises.Fortune and courage assist him: four defeated Moorish kings declare themselves his vassals and all of Spain begins to greet him with the epithet of Cid.The king, to test Jimena, announces Rodrigo's death; the girl faints; then, on the verge of betraying himself, he promises his hand to whoever brings him the Cid's head.A champion shows up, but is defeated and killed by Rodrigo, who finally becomes the husband of the woman whose father he was forced to kill.
In the second drama, The exploits of the Cid , the hero has a secondary role.The dramatic core is made up of the struggles between King Don Sancho II of Castile and his brothers, Don Alfonso VI of León and Doña Urraca, each surrounded by the paradoxical loyalty of their respective vassals.Don Sancho, after having taken the kingdom from Don García and Don Alfonso, wants to take the city of Zamora from his sister Urraca.The city is defended by the loyal Arias Gonzalo and his five intrepid sons.The traitor Vellido Dolfos joins the defenders, who treacherously kills Don Sancho, to the great indignation of his companions.
A vassal of the dead king, Diego Ordóñez de Lara, then appears under the walls of Zamora where the murderer has taken refuge and pronounces the famous challenge-anathema that Castro formulates word for word according to one of the most famous romances.And Zamora must, according to tradition, respond by sending five champions against the outrager.Arias Gonzalo, although he has disapproved of Vellido Dolfos, sends his five children; Diego Ordóñez de Lara kills the first and the second, but by fatally wounding the third he violates the technical rules of the fight and is declared defeated by the dead man.El Cid is the field judge of the fight, which is resolved with the arrival of Don Alfonso, whom everyone recognizes as king, after El Cid has forced him to swear that he had nothing to do at all with the death of his brother..Here too, the author faithfully follows the Ballads (and intersperses entire romances in the work), but the action is inorganic, the drama does not translate into concrete oppositions of feeling, and the atmosphere of fatality that in the preceding work involves both protagonists.
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