An Early Rehash of Lope's Peribanez

Probably the product of the collaboration of a rural autor de comedias with a memorión and perhaps also with a poet in his employ, this early rehash of Peribáñez throws a great deal of light not only on the editing and staging practices of a typical compañía de la legua, but also on the meaning of the original text. Among other things, a systematic comparison between the rehash and Lope's original version reveals, first, that the modifications, additions and cancellations introduced by the adapters were not haphazard but obeyed some specific social and technical reasons: second, that some of these alterations were designed to improve Lope's play; third, that Lope's original was such a subtle and complex poetic construct that it had to be subjected to a rigorous process of simplification and adaptation for the benefit of the rural audience, for whom the new version was intended; and fourth, that the original had to be partly censored because of the revolutionary nature of its central theme. Finally, since some of the ambiguities of the original version are resolved in the rehash, we are allowed a privileged glance into the way a group of seventeenth-century professionals of the theater understood and interpreted Lope's play. (JMR)