Pilgrimage to Patronage. Lope de Vega and the Court of Philip III, 1598-1621 (review)

202BCom, Vol. 55, No. 2 (2003) temporáneos, hasta documentos referentes a festejos en honor del Príncipe de Gales, peticiones de pago, censuras, aprobaciones, por citar algunos ejemplos. Es una curiosa y muy interesante selección de textos que nos permite conocer mejor no sólo al autor, sino la época en la que vivió y escribió. Tras su recorrido por la crítica alarconiana, en la sección de "Reflexiones, tesis e hipótesis," Peña hace deducciones y llega a conclusiones propias, basándose sobre todo en los antecedentes familiares de Alarcón y en las contradicciones que rodean su carácter. En las "Conclusiones ," la autora consigue resumir la evolución de la crítica sobre el dramaturgo en un "tránsito post-mortem del poeta de la indignidad de la burla a la revaloración por parte de crítica" (295). Insiste en la pobreza de los acervos mexicanos en cuanto a ediciones antiguas de Alarcón, y propone traer del extranjero el material bibliográfico inexistente en Mexico, establecer catálogos descriptivos del corpus dramático y fomentar su revisión para "desmitificarlo mediante el análisis de las comedias y la recomposición biográfica" (300), algo a lo que, no cabe duda, esta obra contribuye en gran medida. Nos ofrece Peña, por tanto, un recorrido exhaustivo por la crítica alarconiana en Europa y America, y una fuente de información imprescindible sobre colecciones de comedias y documentos varios sobre Ruiz de Alarcón, localizados, comentados y clasificados con admirable celo profesional . Antonia Petro Loyola Marymount University Wright, Elizabeth R. Pilgrimage to Patronage. Lope de Vega and the Court ofPhilip III, 1598-1621. Lewisburg: Bucknell UP, 2001. 184 pp. Spurred by recent theory (Amelang, Greenblatt, Helgerson, Elias, et al.) that illustrates "how dependency shaped language in early-modem Europe," and similar scholarly examinations ofartists during the reign of Philip IV and the Count-Duke of Olivares, Elizabeth R. Wright's interdisciplinary study endeavors to fill a void in Golden Age studies: the role of the Fénix as courtier during the reign of Philip III and his infamous Reviews203 valido, the Duke of Lerma. Yet, as often happens in studies whose preconceived critical framework is dependent upon a vocabulary germane to different cultural traditions (here mainly Anglo-American and French), the critic, in seeking to find an exact correspondence, is obliged to violently disfigure the author's work. As Christopher B. Weimer (1996) recently stated, such an act recalls the example of Ulysses's foe Procrustes, who employed the rack and the ax to make unfortunate overnight visitors fit his bed precisely. Wright's study begins at the dawn ofPhilip Ill's reign, amid the feverish political realignment following Philip II's death in May of 1598, a period marked in literary history by Lope's extraordinary publishing debut: La Dragontea (Valencia, 1598), an epic poem celebrating Francis Drake's demise in Panama, the pastoral novel Arcadia (Madrid, 1598), and the Isidro (Madrid, 1599), a ten-canto epic hagiography proposing a new patron saint for the court city. Intrigued by Lope's foray into nondramatic genres and his aggressive publication at a time when few ofhis contemporaries used the printing press to circulate their works, Wright postulates that in dedicating these works to three powerful nobles, Lope is motivated by the prospect of winning the new court's favor, receiving mercedes, and, above all, attaining the coveted position of Cronista Real. This, argues Wright, might explain Lope's rationale for shaping Drake's defeat into an imperial, high-styled epic rather than a comedia for the vulgo. Conspicuously silenced from the critic's narrative, however, is a fundamental socio-literary dimension; Lope is writing at a time when comedia production is impossible. Indeed, in the wake of the infanta Catalina's death, and just four months before his very own, Philip II issued an order (pragmática) to close the kingdom's theaters as a sign of national mourning. A whole year would pass before Philip III lifted the ban in celebration of his royal nuptials with Margante ofAustria. Ajustifiable desire to relate text with context (biography) underlies all ofWright's...