Read Ebook: Los Amantes de Teruel Drama en cuatro actos en verso y prosa by Hartzenbusch Juan Eugenio Umphrey G W George Wallace Editor

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PREFACE

INTRODUCTION

BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE

TEXT

NOTES

VOCABULARY

INTRODUCTION

The old city of Teruel, founded by the Aragonese in the latter half of the twelfth century at the junction of the Guadalaviar and the Alfambra as a stronghold in the territory recently recovered from the Moors, was the fitting scene for the action of the legend.... The pioneer life of the city, the depth of sentiment and singleness of purpose of its Aragonese inhabitants, the crusading spirit that carried to victory the armies of Peter II of Arag?n and his more famous son, James the Conqueror, lend probability to a legend that would ordinarily be considered highly improbable from the point of view of historical authenticity. Stripped of the fantastic details that have gathered about it in the many literary treatments given to it by Spanish writers, the legend may be briefly told. In Teruel, at the beginning of the thirteenth century, lived Juan Diego Mart?nez Garc?s de Marsilla and Isabel de Segura. They had loved each other from childhood, but when it became a question of marriage, Isabel's father opposed the union because of the young man's lack of material resources and because a wealthy suitor, Rodrigo de Azagra, had presented himself for the hand of his daughter. All that the entreaties of the lovers could gain from him was the promise that if Marsilla went to the wars, gained fame and riches, and returned before a certain day, he would receive Isabel in marriage. This Marsilla did; but unfortunately he was unable to return until just after the expiration of the time set. When he reached Teruel, he found Isabel married to the wealthy rival. Disappointed in their hopes after so many years of constant love and continual struggle against adversity, Marsilla died of grief, and Isabel soon followed him; separated in life by cruel fate, they were united in death. Buried in the same tomb, they were later disinterred, and their mummified remains may now be seen in the old church of San Pedro in Teruel.

Finally, in the early days of Romanticism, it assumed the dramatic form that has remained most popular down to the present day. On the nineteenth of January of the year 1837 the theatergoing people of Madrid were moved to vociferous applause by a new treatment of the old theme, and a new star of the literary firmament was recognized in the person of Juan Eugenio Hartzenbusch. In his dramatic masterpiece Hartzenbusch eclipsed all the other plays that have dealt with the legend, and more than twenty editions stand as proof of its continued popularity. Besides these many editions of the play, numerous novels, poems, and operas have appeared from time to time. For the most complete bibliography down to 1907 the reader is again referred to that of the official historian of Teruel, Gasc?n y Guimbao. We must now turn our attention to the author of the best dramatic treatment of the legend.

At the time of his marriage in 1830 he was still helping his ailing and despondent father in the workshop; more interested undoubtedly in his literary pursuits, but ever faithful to the call of duty. Until success as a dramatist made it possible for him to gain a living for his family by literature, he continued patiently his manual labor. At his father's death he closed the workshop and for a short time became dependent for a livelihood on stenography, with which he had already eked out the slender returns from the labor of his hands.

The love of study grew stronger in Hartzenbusch as the opportunity to devote himself to it became greater, so that after he had had several plays presented with considerable success, scholarship began to absorb more and more of his time and the intervals between plays began to lengthen. Literary criticism, editorial work in connection with new editions of the Spanish classics, his duties as assistant and, later, chief librarian of the Biblioteca Nacional, these, with the production from time to time of a new play, made him a well-known figure in the literary life of Madrid. His was the quiet life of the modern man of letters, to whom the incidents of greatest interest are of the intellectual order: the production of a new play, the publication of a new book of literary or scholarly value, the discovery of an old manuscript or the announcement of a new theory, the admission of a new member to the Spanish Academy. Serenely tolerant in his outlook upon life, of gentle disposition and ready sympathy, unaffectedly modest, indifferent to the accumulation of property beyond the needs of his simple mode of living, conscientious in the performance of all his duties, he retained to the end of his life the personal esteem of his many friends. When death put an end in 1880 to the long illness that saddened the last years of his life, his mortal remains were conducted to the tomb with all due ceremony by the Spanish Academy, to which membership had been granted him in 1847 as a recognition of his excellent work as dramatist and scholar.

The play as given in this edition differs in many ways from the play as first presented in 1837. More than once the author returned to it, and the numerous editions needed to supply the popular and continuous demand gave him the opportunity to revise it and give it the most artistic finish of which he was capable. Changed literary conditions after Romanticism had run its course are reflected in the more sober dress of the revised play; there are reflected in it, too, the greater restraint, the more scholarly and critical attention to character delineation and literary finish befitting a man who had passed from the warm impulsiveness of youth to the calm rationality of middle age. The student who takes the trouble to compare the text of this edition with that of the first will see many changes: the five acts are reduced to four; some of the prose scenes are now in poetic form; the diction is much improved generally and obscure passages are made clear; some changes in motivation are to be noted, especially in the scenes leading up to the voluntary marriage of Isabel with Azagra; the mother's character is notably ennobled. On the whole, the play has gained by these revisions; what it has lost in freshness and spontaneity has been more than counterbalanced by the more careful delineation of character, improved motivation of action, correctness of diction, and literary finish. The play in its first form is undoubtedly a better example of Romanticism in all its phases, its tendencies toward exaggeration, its crudities of thought and expression, combined with qualities unsurpassed in any other period of literature; in its revised form it is a more artistic production, is still a Romantic play, and one of the best in Spanish literature.

Romanticism, in its general application to all kinds of literature and to the literatures of all countries where it made itself effectively felt, shows the following characteristics:

In the first version there was also some tendency to abuse the new freedom from conventionality in language, a tendency to seek out unusual words and phrases for the sake of their picturesqueness, rather than for their artistic appropriateness. In the polishing and toning-down process, such words and phrases were eliminated, so that the play in its final form serves as a good illustration of the permanent enrichment of the literary language by the Romanticists. Likewise, in its versification, it offers a good example of the metrical variety found in the Spanish dramatists of the Golden Age and revived by the Romanticists.

SCHEME OF VERSIFICATION

BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE

LOS AMANTES DE TERUEL,

DRAMA REFUNDIDO EN CUATRO ACTOS Y EN VERSO Y PROSA

Estrenado en Madrid en el teatro del Pr?ncipe a 19 de enero de 1837

PERSONAS

JUAN DIEGO MART?NEZ GARC?S DE MARSILLA, O MARSILLA. ISABEL DE SEGURA. DO?A MARGARITA. ZULIMA. DON RODRIGO DE AZAGRA. DON PEDRO DE SEGURA. DON MART?N GARC?S DE MARSILLA. TERESA. ADEL. OSM?N.

Soldados moros, cautivos, damas, caballeros, pajes, criados, criadas.

LOS AMANTES DE TERUEL

ACTO PRIMERO

Dormitorio morisco en el alc?zar de Valencia. A la derecha del espectador una cama, junto al proscenio; a la izquierda, una ventana con celos?as y cortinajes. Puerta grande en el fondo, y otras peque?as a los lados.

ESCENA PRIMERA

ZULIMA, ADEL; JUAN DIEGO MARSILLA, adormecido en la cama: sobre ella un lienzo con letras de sangre.

ZULIMA. No vuelve en s?.

ADEL. Todav?a tardar? mucho en volver.

ZULIMA. Fuerte el narc?tico ha sido.

ADEL. Poco ha se lo administr?.-- D?gnate de o?r, se?ora, la voz de un s?bdito fiel, que orillas de un precipicio te ve colocar el pie.

ZULIMA. Si disuadirme pretendes, no te fatigues, Adel. Partir de Valencia quiero, y hoy, hoy mismo partir?.

ADEL. ?Con ese cautivo?

ZULIMA. T? me has de acompa?ar con ?l.

ADEL. ?As? al esposo abandonas? 15 ?Un Amir, se?ora, un Rey!

ZULIMA. Ese Rey, al ser mi esposo, me prometi? no tener otra consorte que yo. ?Lo ha cumplido? Ya lo ves. 20 A traerme una rival march? de Valencia ayer. Libre a la nueva sultana mi puesto le dejar?.

ADEL. Considera....

ZULIMA. Est? resuelto. 25 El renegado Za?n, el que aterra la comarca de Albarrac?n y Teruel, llamado por m? ha venido, y tiene ya en su poder 30 casi todo lo que yo de mis padres hered?, que es dem?s para vivir con opulencia los tres. De la alcazaba saldremos 35 a poco de anochecer.

ADEL. Y ese cautivo, se?ora, ?te ama? ?Sabes t? qui?n es?

ZULIMA. Es noble, es valiente, en una mazmorra iba a perecer 40 de enfermedad y de pena, de fr?o, de hambre y de sed: yo le doy la libertad, riquezas, mi mano: ?qui?n rehusa estos dones? ?Oh! 45 Si ofendiera mi altivez con una repulsa, caro le costara su desd?n conmigo. Tiempo hace ya que este acero emponzo??, 50 furiosa contra mi aleve consorte Zeit Abenzeit: quien es capaz de vengarse en el Pr?ncipe, tambi?n escarmentara al esclavo, 55 como fuera menester.

ADEL. ?Qu? habr? escrito en ese lienzo con su sangre? Yo no s? leer en su idioma; pero puedo llamar a cualquier 60 cautivo....

ZULIMA. ?l nos lo dir?, yo se lo preguntar?.

ADEL. ?No fuera mejor hablarle yo primero, t? despu?s?

ZULIMA. Le voy a ocultar mi nombre: 65 ser Zoraida fingir?, hija de Merv?n.

ADEL. ?Merv?n! ?Sabes que ese hombre sin ley conspira contra el Amir?

ZULIMA. A ?l le toca defender 70 su trono, en vez de ocuparse, contra la jurada fe, en devaneos que un d?a lugar a su ruina den. Mas Ramiro no recobra 75 los sentidos: buscar? un esp?ritu a prop?sito....

ESCENA II

OSM?N, por una puerta lateral.--ADEL, MARSILLA

OSM?N. ?Se fu? Zulima?

ADEL. Se fu?. T? nos habr?s acechado.

OSM?N. He cumplido mi deber. 80 Al ausentarse el Amir, con este encargo qued?. Es m?s cauto nuestro due?o que esa liviana mujer.-- El lienzo escrito con sangre, 85 ?d?nde est??

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