The Representation of the American Indian in the Comedia
Abstract
There exist less than thirty known comedias treating Spain's engagement with
the New World. With access to the entire corpus, I analyse the genesis of the
representative stereotype of the Indian, and trace its transposition from festival
pageantry and allegorical iconography to the stage of the comedia. I relate scenes
from the plays to works of triumphalist sculpture and the semiology of modem staged
spectacle, and compare the sexual metaphor of the iconography of the First
Encounter, with a similar tableau from the corpus. I then analyse the emblematic
representation of female Indians in the corpus, and their role in securing the
inscription of Spanish male "hegemony" and "closure".
There follows a discussion of the role of the Devil in the deception of the
Indians. I consider several plays in the light of research on the origins of ethnology,
and discuss the extent to which the depiction of the Indians on stage can be ascribed
to their idolatry and its rituals. I then analyse the plays' demonisation of native
orality. The "performance" of the politico-religious Requerimiento, both in history
and on the stage, is measured in literary terms against the "fetishisation" of Western
writing in the Conquest, followed by an assessment of the interrogation of these issues
by Lope de Vega according to the notion of his manipulation of rhetorical
"politeness".
Finally, I contrast the function of scenes of horror and violence perpetrated by
Indians, with those carried out by Spaniards. I return to the topic of staged spectacle
and analyse the use of such scenes in "serious" and then "burlesque" mode,as defined
according to theories of genre within the comedia. I link this to "carnival humour",
and apply this to the comic treatment of topics of cannibalism and mutilation
involving the Indians, and ask how this informs upon their representation in the
corpus as a whole.
Authors
McGrath, David JohnCollections
- Theses [4125]