Teatro cortesano en la España de los Austrias (review)

210BCom, Vol. 54, No. 1 (2002) una vez más, a censura a través del papel encarnado por el rey. Aunque este estudio resulte de cierto interés, quiero hacer notar algunos problemas. Primeramente, aunque el libro se titula Paradigmas del teatro clásico español, la idea de modelo paradigmático no se desarrolla: simplemente se analizan cuatro obras de tres dramaturgos importantes. Al no existir tal discusi ón, ni teoría global que sustente esta noción de paradigma en el libro, no resulta claro en qué se basa el autor para elegir estos textos como paradigmáticos. En ocasiones parece que las discusiones de las cuatro obras son trabajos concebidos independientemente y posteriormente agrupados. Como última observación, la bibliografía es extensa pero incompleta y sin actualizar. Pese a su falta de foco, el texto resulta de interés como contribuci ón al estudio de la dramaturgia de Lope, Tirso y Calderón, y como exploración del tema de la Figura del Poder, en particular para aquellos que estén dedicados a investigar los cuatro dramas que analiza este libro. Elma Dassbach Southwest State University Teatro cortesano en la España de los Austrias. Ed. José María Diez Borque. Cuadernos de Teatro Clásico, 10. Madrid: Compañía Nacional de Teatro Clásico, 1998. 304 pp. + 14 illus. The tenth cuaderno also presents itself as a first: a compendium of research on all aspects of histrionismo dependent on the theatre patronized by and for the delight of kings, magnates, and great ladies, and on how spaces and ideas for performance were adapted from the public corrales, and how later on court drama was adapted to the corrales. The valuable illustrations are said to be all that have been so far found among the documents. The first contributions are surveys corresponding to each of the reigns of the five Habsburg kings. First J. Oleza concentrates on the comedia afantasía, chiefly that of Torres Naharro, as the major advance before the abdication and death of Carlos I, both Reviews21 1 in scenic practice and in methods of securing patronage. In Spain, the courtly drama was something quite new, not a continuation , like other ceremonies of Burgundian usage. There was no center; many courts provided audiences to view the chivalresque and religious pieces by Encina, Fernández de Heredia, Luis Milán, and Gil Vicente. An important locus and source of theoretical writing was the Rome of the pontificate of Leo X. Encina and Torres found patrons there, and that is how Isabella d'Esté may have been the original of Torres's character Divina (20). Oleza summarizes what Torres could have learned from Italian practice—as against what he derived from Celestina—in the confection of his plays a fantasia, and makes an interesting comparison with Italian developments in the novella. These theoretical writings were held by many court libraries and were cited by others at court, while native dramatists—Rueda, Rojas Villandrando , Lope de Vega—made no mention of them. Oleza gives a useful list of the works in question (28). A. de la Granja takes up the developments during the life of Philip ?, from his own performance as a little prince at his mother 's reception into Zaragoza. "El Rey Prudente" was not much interested in theatre beyond its symbolic-ideological possibilities, though his French queen Isabel de Valois promoted it, and La Granja details the recorded festivities (40): the appearance of caballeros de Amadís at Segovia (45), and what took place at the ceremonies attending the beginning of El Escorial in 1573 (4647 ). Philip himself liked to watch Ganassa, and the comic Cisneros is recorded as being able to make him laugh (49). There was an early instance of a mythological spectacle, Lafábula de Dafne with nobles as amateur actors and actresses, c. 1590, promoted by the widow-empress Maria. The reign seeing most innovations was Philip Ill's, here surveyed by I. Arellano, beginning with the wedding festival of 1599, its dramatic portion written by Lope de Vega. As in many such cases the title has not survived (if it even had one). The comedias de repente, those...