Diez comedias atribuidas a Lope de Vega: Estudio de su autenticidad (review)

BOOK REVIEWS PORTUONDO, AUGUSTO A. Diez comedias atribuidas a Lope de Vega: Estudio de su autenticidad. Charlottesville, Virginia: Biblioteca Siglo de Oro, 1980. Paper. 191 pp. $13.00. The doubtful authenticity of many plays attributed to Lope de Vega is a source of continuing debate. In order to deal with this problem, a number of objective criteria have been developed and applied by investigators such as J. H. Arjona, Courtney Bruerton, Fred M. Clark, William L. Fichter, S. Griswold Morley, Walter Poesse and William E. Wilson. More recently, several doctoral dissertations at the University of Virginia, under the direction of Donald McGrady, have re-evaluated and combined the more useful objective methods for evaluating authenticity. In addition, the authors of these dissertations applied their criteria to different groups of comedias attributed to Lope de Vega. Augusto A. Portuondo's monograph, Diez comedias atribuidas a Lope de Vega, is one of these studies. Portuondo utilizes name, orthoepy, rhyme, vocabulary and verbal forms such as the different endings of the past subjuntive to test the authenticity of ten plays attributed by some to Lope de Vega. To these methods, he adds more subjective criteria and comes up with solid reasons for his conclusions. Of the ten comedias analyzed, two are definitely ascribed by Portuondo to Lope de Vega: La esclava de su galán and Porfiar hasta morir. This merely corroborates the opinions of previous critics such as Emilio Cotarelo y Mori, M. Ménendez Pelayo, Courtney Bruerton and S. Griswold Morley. Discussion of a third play, ¿De cuándo acá nos vino?, is more stimulating. Although the first and third acts are preserved in an autograph manuscript by Lope, the authorship of the second act has been debated, some critics attributing it to Alonso Remón. Morley and Bruerton, however, believe that the stylistic differences between acts one and three on the one hand, and act two on the other, are minimal. Utilizing the techniques listed above, Portuondo attempts to resolve this situation, concluding that: «A pesar de las autorizadas opiniones de García Soriano y de Morley y Bruerton, las discrepancias de contenido entre el acto segundo y el tercero, más el análisis 169 1 70Bulletin of the Comediantes objetivo de dicho segundo acto, señalan elementos suficientes para negar la autoría de Lope» (p. 71). In addition, Portuondo suggests the possibility that the second act, as we have it, is a refundición made by the autor de comedias Pedro de Valdés. Studying the other seven plays included in this monograph, the author concludes that, in their present form, they could not have been written by Lope de Vega. Two of these, although considered of doubtful authenticity by Morley and Bruerton, have been the subject of recent debate. Portuondo carefully refutes the arguments of Ruth Kossoff and Franco Meregalli who believe Lope de Vega to be the author of Los cautivos de Argel. Analyzing La ilustrefregona, the author oí Diez comedias presents similar evidence against Joseph G. Fucilla's argument in favor of Lope's authorship. Two plays not commonly attributed to Lope de Vega are included in Portuondo 's monograph, since the discovery of another version of each may lead some to revert to a previous belief in Lope's authorship. In his discussion ofEl principe don Carlos, Portuondo agrees with Vern Williamsen's assessment that the comedia is not Lope de Vega's, but may be attributed to Mira de Amescua. In his analysis of La selva confusa, Portuondo agrees with Albert Sloman who attributes the work to Calderón, but argues that the recently dicovered version included in theparte XXVII is not a corrected and amended version: «Creemos que dicha comedia es una adaptación muy pobremente hecha de la comedia manuscrita de Calderón del mismo nombre» (p. 172). While most of the discussion in this monograph centers on the several objective methods utilized to determine authorship: «El tema...es ya sospechoso: la superioridad inherente del noble y la abyección del villano» (p. 32). Such a statement may deserve further discussion and consideration. Finally, Los milagros del desprecio is rejected as Lope's work by Portuondo in spite of Francisco...