Aztecs on Stage: Religious Theater in Colonial Mexico ed. by Louise M. Burkhart (review)

This work was planned as an introduction—and an invitation—to approach an extensive compilation and translation of material on the presentation of Nahuatl (Aztec) theater during the colonial era. The assembly was edited by a group of prominent North American specialists, including senior editor Louise Burkhart (professor of anthropology at University at Albany, SUNY). The collection comprises four volumes, published between 2004 and 2009. In Aztecs on Stage six selections were made from the four volumes; these are conveniently presented only in translation from Nahuatl to English. This shows the reader the richness of the indigenous theatrical phenomenon, which perhaps began to develop from the third decade of the sixteenth century, although the oldest known dated piece is from 1590.

The six texts are accompanied by a very helpful general introduction and reading and pronunciation guides. Also included is an appendix that lists the twenty-two or twenty-three surviving theatrical works, providing the title (original or arbitrary), the thematic type, the place of origin, the author or copyist when known, the location where the manuscript is presently housed, and information on its publication.

Aztecs on Stage fulfills the basic purpose of its editors and translators; it creates a starting point from which members of the nonspecialist public can gain access to one of the least-known aspects of colonial Nahuatl culture. The book shows the surprising richness of the potential topics that can be investigated. It also opens a kind of “menu” that makes it possible for a reader with more specialized interests to access the multivolume magnum opus, where each theatrical piece is presented with its corresponding text in Nahuatl and copious explanatory notes. Aztecs on Stage is a worthwhile preliminary guide to the more extensive work. Its introduction very successfully synthesizes the substantive subjects of Nahuatl theater that are analyzed in the four earlier volumes.

The main thrust of the authors’ effort in this publication, which is intensified in the previous compilations, is to publicize the principal colonial Nahuatl theatrical works in English. Now we have a reasonable corpus that allows us to analyze this artistic phenomenon in depth and with certainty. Moreover, within the expressive richness of the texts per se, we find other issues that are well worth considering. These writings can help us better to understand, for example, the reception of Christianity within the Nahua settlements in central Mexico and the assimilation of elements of the old cosmovision, which is one of the most complex aspects of the Indochristian culture in New Spain. For obvious reasons, such elements do not create their own discourses within theatrical works. On account of their contexts, we are more likely to encounter these views as brief, intriguing references. We find, for example, links between the figure of Jesus Christ and the ancient solar cults.

Another aspect that we can now study in more detail is the topics that were chosen as representative of the scenarios. Thanks to the useful appendix, we can see that the types of themes are varied, with the histories of the Passion of Jesus Christ predominating for highly justifiable reasons. The authors explain the success of portrayals of the Epiphany—the adoration of the Child Jesus by the wise men—because of their association with images of the ancestral nobles and indigenous rulers (the pipiltin and the tlatocáyotl) who were owed respect from their subjects (pp. 82–83).

A final significant contribution is that the authors of this great compilation have dedicated each of the volumes to the Mexican expert Fernando Horcasitas Pimentel (1924–80), who in 1974 provided a seminal work on the theater of New Spain that is tremendously useful. Later, in 2004, María Stern and associates edited a second volume that contains his unpublished material, accompanied by translations and...