Thornton Wilder and Lope's Peregrino Lists

Bulletin Of The Comediantes Vol. Ill April, 1951 No. 1 Thornton Wilder and Lope's Peregrino Lists by Courtney Bruerton, Harvard University For the Comediantes the high point of the MLA meeting was the brilliant and dynamic address of Thornton Wilder in the General Romance Section. Before a large and enthusiastic audience Mr. Wilder described his solution of the mystery of the order of titles in Lope's Peregrino lists. Lope listed them, with an occasional exception , according to the autores to whom he sold them—for example, a series of plays sold to Porres, another series to Granados, etc. Thus when, in the midst of the Porres list, some titles are found for which the autor is not known, the indication is that they too were first played by Porres. When physical descriptions of some of the characters in the plays correspond to those of similar roles in known Porres plays, the evidence is ree'nforced, for Mr. Wilder has found evidence that Lope definitely tailored his characters in many plays for the actors who were to portray them. There is reason to believe that Lope listed the plays of each autor chronologically . Therefore, when we find a play of uncertain date listed between one of 1600 and another of 1602, it may be assumed, subject to further possible confirmation, that its date is 1600-1602. In the second Peregrino list Lope, or another , selects from each published Parte, in order, the plays sold to one autor and then returns to Parte I to start the list sold to another manager. Mr. Wilder also announced his discovery of the names of Micaela and Diego Diaz in the refarto on the Gálvez copy of El blasón de los Chaves de Villalba in the possession oí Señor Amezúa. This is the first document discovered which bears witness to Micaela de Luián's activity as an actress: it also shows that her husband was in Spain some years after he has been supposed to have left for Peru. Judging from the first license, the play was first performed in January, 1600. Good Fortune and Tragedy with the Comediantes by Ramon Rozzell, Ohio State University At New York, on December 28, the Comediantes experienced both sorrow and pleasure. The sorrow came at the afternoon meeting with the announcement of the sudden death of Harry C. Heaton of New York University. The pleasure had been initiated in the morning at the Romance Section held in the Statler. There, in a paper that will remain unique in the annals of MLA, Thornton Wilder, the celebrated novelist and dramatist, had given a blood transfusion to academic investigation everywhere and had impressed a diversified audience with the vitality of Spain's Golden Age theater. It was fitting, indeed, that one of the world's foremost Hispanists, Americo Castro, left his seat to shake the speaker's hand before the applause had died away. It was now noon, and—to paraphrase Cervantes —the Comediantes went to Bonat's for ...