Conscience on Stage: The Comedia as Casuistry in Early Modern Spain (review)

Hilaire Kallendorf, in a fascinating critical move, has turned from exorcism to casuistry. In her earlier book, Exorcism and Its Texts (Toronto, 2003), Kallendorf showed that, because the devil was thought to be able to enter bodily organs and infect the memory, the imagination, and even the seat of reason, possession could threaten notions of selfhood. Now, she evinces the instability of this selfhood as it is faced with "case morality." Very much like exorcisms that detached devilish forces from the self, casuistry serves to calm moral qualms, or perhaps it exacerbates them.

In Conscience on Stage, Kallendorf connects answers concerning case morality given by confessors to the ethical dilemmas faced by characters in the Spanish comedia. Her book begins with a learned and very useful overview of the history of casuistry, which shows how Spanish Jesuits in early modern Spain brought the practice to its heights. Professorships on the subject became common as sermons discussed the many issues involved; books on the subject were published in Latin and in the vernacular. Sermons and speeches were given, often taking a dialogic and even theatrical format. After all, casuistry moved from general moral principles to specific circumstances. The devil was in the details, and participants at a lecture were given the opportunity to present different resolutions and extenuating circumstances. Kallendorf asserts, "Any situation involving choice among various options could invoke the principles of casuistry to prioritize levels of virtue and vice as they appeared relative to one another" (11). Indeed, she shows how plays written and performed in Jesuit schools may have been the impetus for the uses of casuistry on the secular Spanish stage; after all, schools were performing plays long before Lope de Vega burst upon the scene. Kallendorf also point out that a number of playwrights had studied with the Jesuits in their youth and that many became priests in later life. They would thus be most familiar with the Jesuit vision of theater as pulpit.

Having demonstrated how casuistry is possibly a key factor in the mindset of playwrights, Kallendorf sets out to prove her case, to show that "cases of conscience" were central to early modern drama. First, she shows how the term "case" pervades the vocabulary of these plays. Cases are constructed and verified; the language of fault and blame is ever-present; and the question of what to do is often asked, as well as the question of what the punishment should be. She argues that term acaso is used when guilt is only postulated; ocasión is interpreted as the occasion for sin, etc. From the analysis of language, Kallendorf concludes that "we might see words like caso, intento or ocasión as present marks of an absent confessor, the phantasm who hovers over the comedia text … many casuistical speeches in the comedias are introduced by a single hallmark question: 'What should I do?'" (63). Although one might argue that ocasión is a term of classical provenance and of visual impact, because it is the subject of a number of emblems, this does not mean that it cannot also contain a casuistic valance. No matter how appealing Kallendorf's approach might be, we must be careful not to use it indiscriminately and reduce terms to narrow meanings.

Kallendorf's discussion of the term "What to do?" is particularly engaging. Here, she looks at moral dilemmas and conflicting duties, to hierarchies of virtue and vice, to the double bind, and to recognition and confession. Memorable characters from the comedias, from Catalinón to Sancho Ortiz, and from Rosaura to Mencía, show their concern for these important issues, and Kallendorf makes a strong case for their casuistic link. The question "What to do?" even surfaces when characters ask it of honor, of fate, of the heavens, and of demons (123-27). Other important insights surface in this clearly-written and well-structured book, such as the degree of culpability in Casandra's...