THE FIRST PERFORMANCE OF CALDERÓN'S EL MA YOR ENCANTO AMOR

Abstract

E. Cotarelo y Mori in his life of Calderón discusses the first performance of El mayor encanto amor in 1635 and concludes that there were two versions of this play, of which only one survives. This is the printed text which appeared in Part II of Calderón's Comedias, published in Madrid in 1637. It is headed: “Fiesta que se representò à su Magestad noche de S. Juan del año de seiscientos y treinta y cinco, en el estanque del Real Palacio del buen Retiro”. In addition to this text, however, there exists a copy of a manuscript which was formerly in the possession of the Biblioteca Nacional, Madrid, describing the performance of a play about Circe and Ulysses, and headed: “La Circe: Fiesta que se representó en el Estanque grande del Retiro, invencion de Cosme Loti, a petición de la Excelentísima Señora Condesa de Olivares, Duquesa de San Lucar la Mayor, la noche de San Juan”.

BSS Subject Index:

• MADRID — SPAIN — HISTORY, LITERATURE, CULTURE & SOCIETY
• CALDERÓN DE LA BARCA, PEDRO (1600–1681)
• THEATRES — SPAIN
• COURT DRAMA [OF THE GOLDEN AGE]
• MAYOR ENCANTO AMOR, EL [P. CALDERÓN]
• STAGE/THEATRE/PERFORMANCE

Notes

¹E. Cotarelo y Mori, Ensayo sobre la vida y obras de D. Pedro Calderón de la Barca (Madrid 1924), 157–66.

²There are two versions of Part II, both published in 1637. In the second, the play is merely described in the index as “Fiesta que se representò a Su Magestad”.

³ It was copied by D. Casiano Pellicer, Tratado histórico sobre el origen y progresos de la comedia y del histrionismo en España (Madrid 1804), Parte segunda, 146–66.

⁴ “Cartas de algunos PP. de la Compañía de Jesús”, in Memorial histórico español, XIII, 200.

⁵ “Cartas de algunos PP. de la Compañía de Jesús”, in Memorial histórico español, XIII, 201–02.

¹ “Cartas de algunos PP. de la Compañía de Jesús”, in Memorial histórico español, XIII, 224.

²The reference to Circe coming across the water in a triumphal car is an error for Galatea.

¹ L. Rouanet, “Un autographe inédit de Calderón”, RHi, VI (1899), 196–200;

¹ The two documents are to be found in the Archivo de la Diputacion Provincial, Madrid, signatura 34-A-19, fols. 73 and 75. My thanks are due to the administrators of the Research Fund of King's College, Newcastle upon Tyne, for a grant to assist my work on theatrical documents in Madrid.