The Cavalier in the Yellow Doublet Read Free Page A

marked the difference between their noble stratagems and the ignoble impostures of lesser writers. Lope himself described this better than anyone:
    Whenever the time comes to write a play
I put Aristotle under lock and key
And stow Terence and Plautus out of the way
So that I’m deaf to their shouts and pleas,
For even mute books have something to say.
    This should not be taken as an apology by that Phoenix of Inventiveness for employing stratagems lacking in taste, but, rather, as an explanation of why he refused to conform to the tastes of those learned neo-Aristotelian scholars, who, as one man, censured his wildly successful plays, yet would have given their right arm to put their name to them or, better still, to take the money. The play that afternoon was not, of course, by Lope but by Tirso, although the result was similar, for the work, a so-called cloak-and-sword drama, contained much wonderful poetry and turned, inevitably, on love and intrigue, but touched also on more somber themes: for example, Madrid as a place of deception and delusion, a place of falsehood where the valiant soldier comes to be rewarded for his valor and finds only disillusion; it also criticized the Spaniards’ scorn for work and their hunger for a life of luxury beyond that appropriate to their station. For this, too, was a very Spanish tendency, one that had already dragged us into the abyss several times before and one that would persist for years to come, exacerbating the moral infirmity that destroyed the Spanish empire, that empire of two worlds—the legacy of hard, arrogant, brave men who had emerged out of eight centuries spent cutting Moorish throats, with nothing to lose and everything to gain. In the year one thousand six hundred and twenty-six—when the events I am relating took place—the sun had not yet set upon Spain, although it very soon would. Seventeen years later, as a lieutenant at Rocroi, I would hold on high our tattered flag, despite the battering from the French cannon, and would myself bear witness to the sad fading of our former glory as I stood in the midst of the last squadron formed by our poor, faithful infantry. When an enemy officer asked me how many men there had been in the old, now decimated regiment, I said simply: “Count the dead.” And it was there that I closed Captain Alatriste’s eyes for the last time.
    But I will speak of these things when the moment arrives. Let us return to the Corral de la Cruz and that afternoon’s performance of a new play. The resumption of the play aroused the same state of expectancy that I described earlier. From our bench, the captain, don Francisco, and I were now gazing across at the stage, where the second act was just beginning. Petronila and Tomasa came on again, leaving to the spectators’ imagination the beauty of the garden, which was only hinted at by an ivy-clad shutter placed at one of the stage entrances. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the captain lean forward and rest his arms on the balustrade. His aquiline profile was lit by a bright ray of sunlight that found its way through a tear in the awning erected to shade the audience from the glare, for the Corral faced west and was on a hill. Both female players looked very striking in their male costumes; this was a fashion which neither pressure from the Inquisition nor royal edict had managed to expunge from the theater, for the simple reason that people liked it too much. Similarly, when some of Castile’s more Pharisaic councilors—egged on by certain fanatical clerics—tried to ban plays in Spain altogether, this was again thwarted by the ordinary people, who refused to have this pleasure taken away from them, arguing moreover, and quite rightly, too, that part of the price of every ticket went to support good works and hospitals.
    However, to go back to the play, the two women disguised as men stepped out onto the stage and were warmly applauded by the audience—packing yard, tiered