Until death do us part: Matrimony, Casti Connubii, and the Catholic Church in Federico García Lorca’s Yerma

Yerma, one of Spaniard Federico García Lorca’s (1898–1936) best-known plays, is about a married woman referred to as Yerma who, because of her inability to conceive a child, becomes obsessed with having one and in the end kills her husband Juan out of frustration. On December 31, 1930, around the time before Lorca would set out to pen what would become Yerma, Pope Pius XI promulgated the encyclical Casti Connubii, which stressed the sanctity of marriage by reaffirming that “… the conjugal act is destined primarily by nature for the begetting of children”. The coincidence of the appearance and promulgation of the encyclical points to what the play is about, namely understanding whether sexuality should be a means or an end. It is Lorca’s subversive response to the message of the encyclical; his take on what the sacrament of matrimony—and all relationships for that matter– is really all about. This article explores Lorca’s ironic and subversive use of Catholic religious imagery in Yerma within the context of the papal encyclical’s message vis a vis the author’s liberating view of sexual desire.