—54→
The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Cervantes's moving, profoundly spiritual La española inglesa is born under the sign of transgression. The tale unfolds during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I (1588-1603), when England and Spain were mortal enemies vying for temporal and religious supremacy. How then can one account for the story's heroine, the lady in the title, who is both an English Spanishwoman and a Spanish Englishwoman? Somehow the narrative terrain readers traverse from the initial act of kidnapping to the triumphant final scene of restoration and fulfillment manages to answer that very question and resolve the apparent paradox of the title. At the same time, Cervantes subtly transfigures the text in ways designed to inspire readers to submit their hearts and minds to divine influence and Christian values that transcend self-interest and prejudice.
Prior to Alban K. Forcione's groundbreaking research on
Cervantes's engagement with romance and Erasmian thought, much of the
scholarship on
La española inglesa focused either on
the seeming implausibility of its plot and thinness of its characterization, or
on internal chronological inconsistencies and uncertainty regarding the story's
date of composition102. Some critics escaped this scholarly bifurcation
—55→
between aesthetic and sociohistorical concerns, notably Joaquín
Casalduero, who identified the ascendant movement towards spiritual
purification and unity in
La española inglesa, and Rafael
Lapesa, who noted the literary kinship between this story, the
Persiles (1617), and the other
novelas idealistas (Casalduero 125-29;
Lapesa 258-63). Still Casalduero downplayed many of the text's descriptive
passages and sociohistorical details as «lo
pintoresco»
(132-34), while Lapesa
stopped just short of integrating historical fact with fictional form
(250-58103). Forcione has stressed Cervantes's sophisticated reworking
of romance in the
Novelas ejemplares (1613), particularly the
author's complex adaptation and accommodation of the genre's conventions to
convey to readers multiple levels of exemplarity-aesthetic, spiritual,
political, social, historical. These multilayered hermeneutic renditions of
romance, activated by reading, operate simultaneously in the narratives to
stimulate thoughts and emotions. Modern readers of
La gitanilla,
La española inglesa,
El amante liberal,
Las dos doncellas, and
La ilustre fregona, the romances that form
the utopian core of the
Novelas ejemplares, in general come to these
stories ill-equipped to appreciate fully the significance of the relationships
Cervantes establishes between romance patterns and sociohistorical facts104.
La española inglesa poses an
especially acute
—56→
problem in this regard because the narrative
virtually commands the reading public to reconcile the tale's historical
referentiality and factual specificity with its idyllic enactment of dreamlike
romance.
In
The Fictive and the Imaginary, Wolfgang Iser
characterizes the actualization of literature as a fictionalizing process that
consists of three transgressive acts: (1) selection, or the crossing of
extratextual, sociocultural systems with literary systems delimited by the
text; (2) combination, or the dynamic foregrounding and backgrounding of the
lexical, semantic, and literary codes in the text; and (3) disclosure, or the
revelation of fiction as fiction, in which readers transcend selection and
combination to arrive at a realm of experience beyond the limits of the
interactive extratextual and intratextual systems of meaning. While Cervantes
proffers a fluid, seamless interplay of selection and combination in
novelas such as
La gitanilla, he employs a different
aesthetic in
La española inglesa, compressing
selection and combination in an at times jarring fashion. The resultant,
sometimes jolting juxtaposition of sociohistorical facts and romance
conventions explains to a large degree the difficulty scholars have had in
articulating in critical discourse the interaction of the two in the text.
Following Iser's model, one might designate as acts of transgression the
alternately conflictive and harmonious incursions of these two spheres of
referentiality on each other in
La española inglesa; however, in
actuality, one might more accurately label them acts of transfiguration in
which the imaginative potential of the fictional world they constitute far
exceeds the sum of that world's component parts. I believe that the affective
and intellectual power of
La española inglesa resides precisely
in the creation of an imaginary aperture in the narrative, in the construction
of an «as-if» world that inspires readers to adopt a certain point
of view towards this «temporary displacement of... [their] own
reality»
(Iser 19-20105).
Cervantes alerts readers to the presence of both historical
referents and romance conventions at the very beginning of
La española inglesa. The story opens
with an act of transgression, a kidnapping, a classic romance motif that recurs
several times in the tale106. The author elects to enact the
kidnapping within a historical frame of reference, namely the sacking of
Cádiz by the English, which took place in 1587 and 1596. Clotaldo, an
English noble and naval officer participating in the raid, returns to London
with a seven-year-old Spanish girl among the «spoils» of war
(«Entre los despojos...». 47). He disobeys a direct order from his
commanding officer in doing so, because he cannot resist Isabela's
extraordinary beauty, an attraction which the narrator hastens to qualify as
pure and Christian (48). The modern audience might smile at the moral
self-consciousness of the voice, but in fact Cervantes has provided readers
with two additional, imaginative points of entry into the fictional world of
romance. He has made an oblique, figurative reference to the incest motif,
which predictably appears as a subversive taboo element in such idealizing
tales, and in rejecting that possibility, has informed readers that
supernatural forces and a higher realm of being that lie beyond human
understanding are at work in the story, governing Clotaldo's actions and
dictating the subsequent course of events. The Englishman's heinous crime
generates the synergy peculiar to the romance plot, predicated on the polarized
oppositions. Given the circumstances in which it occurs, the kidnapping not
surprisingly appears to pit the English against the Spanish, Protestants
against Catholics, servitude against freedom, and evil against good-tensions
that mirror the conflicts of the sociohistorical moment, and more than likely
the attitudes of many of Cervantes's contemporary readers.
La española inglesa moves slowly
forward through a succession of episodic adventures that vacillate between good
and bad fortune, but that inevitably lead the protagonists and readers to an
emotionally charged scene of anagnorisis, recovery, and realization in Catholic
Spain. Cervantes inscribes an up-down, forward-moving plot within a dynamic,
circular frame of divine intervention that works through Isabela and Ricaredo
to propel them back to the homeland of the true faith. The protagonists'
tortuous path traces a series of adventures that, by accident or providential
design, test the steadfastness of
—58→
their love and religious faith,
which are inseparable in
La española inglesa. Fate, challenges,
and remarkable coincidences -staples of romance fiction- saturate the plot of
the tale. When he returns to England with Isabela, Clotaldo and his wife
Catalina raise the girl as their own child. Isabela at first regards her
kidnapper's son Ricaredo as a brother, but as both young people mature, they
grow wiser, more virtuous and more in love. As adults they pledge undying love
for one another and receive his parents' blessing for their betrothal. But when
they seek the Queen's approval of their wedding match, so taken is the monarch
by Isabela's name, beauty, and goodness that she decides Ricaredo must prove
himself worthy of such a prize. She sends him apirating to pillage and plunder
with the Crown's permission. During his quest, the hero encounters ships
belonging to Arnaute Mamí, the Turkish corsair who captured Cervantes.
Mention of this historical figure suddenly foregrounds the story's crossing of
extratextual and fictional boundaries, drawing readers' attention to its
transgressive practices. Ricaredo returns with more than enough loot to satisfy
the Queen, not to mention Isabela's long-lost parents, whom he just happens to
bump into on the high seas. A happy ending seems imminent when the mother of
Ricaredo's rival Arnesto vengefully poisons Isabela, whom she holds responsible
for her son's misfortunes. The heroine survives due to the timely intervention
of Queen Elizabeth, although Isabela loses her beauty. Yet Ricaredo maintains
his love for the young lady now described as «un monstruo de fealdad»
(81). He rejects an alternate bride, set aside before Isabela, and
secretly exchanges wedding vows with his beloved. The young couple then
initiate a plan of action to avoid conflict in London and reunite them
eventually in Spain. Isabela returns home with her parents, while Ricaredo goes
on a pilgrimage to Rome to confirm his faith and improve his religious
practices. During the ensuing interval of time, Isabela and her parents settle
in Sevilla, she recovers her former beauty and grows more devout in her faith,
and her family recovers its previous wealth and prominence. A letter announcing
Ricaredo's death prompts the English Spanishwoman to enter the convent, but on
the day she is to take the veil, her husband shows up just in time to prevent
her from making that final step. Ricaredo recounts his story, involving the
false report of his death, his kidnapping by the Turks and subsequent
captivity, and his deliverance, thanks to the intervention of the Trinitarian
friars and the mercy of one of his Moorish captors, whom he had previously
spared when he had the upper hand as a corsair captain. The couple renew their
vows as the city's temporal and ecclesiastical
—59→
authorities witness
the ceremony. With a fairy-tale flourish that also returns Cervantes's audience
to the historical present of post-tridentine Spain, the narrator states that as
far as he knows, Ricaredo and Isabela still live in wedded bliss in
Sevilla.
Gemination, a common feature of romance, emerges as one of the primary structural components in La española inglesa. The story divides symmetrically into two sections, with the poisoning of Isabela as the peripetal point signaling the narrative's ascending movement towards greater spirituality and powerful, emotional evocation107. The locus of dramatic activity shifts from Protestant England, the court of Elizabeth I, and the home of Ricaredo's parents in part one, to Catholic Spain, the convent of Santa Paula, and the home of Isabela's parents in part two. Ricaredo's kidnapping in the second half serves as a counterpart to Isabela's in the first half. The Christian mercy Ricaredo extends to his Spanish and Turkish captives in the first section is returned in the second section, when he is a captive of the Moors and is ransomed by Spanish friars. Both protagonists encounter doubles of themselves in other characters. Isabela and the English sovereign have their name in common and share uncommon virtue and wisdom, but the heroine finds a rival in a Scottish noblewoman who plans to marry the hero. Ricaredo battles a demonic double in his rival Arnesto, who nearly kills him in Rome. Three grand public processions echo each other and punctuate La española inglesa's spiritual ascent. In part one, a richly gowned and bejeweled Isabela makes her way through throngs of bystanders to reach the English palace of the Virgin Queen. After his pirate adventures, Ricaredo, armed as a conquering warrior, makes a similar journey through the streets of London to his audience with the Queen. The procession in Sevilla in part two, however, outdoes the previous ones in pageantry, theatrical staging, and representation of temporal and divine power. Here Isabela's destination is church and convent, God's palace, where she seeks to offer her beauty, pure heart, and earthly riches to Christ and to Mary, the Virgin Queen of Heaven. Most of the city accompanies her, including the magistrate and the archbishop's vicar, and together the crowd of spectators experiences the miraculous appearance of Ricaredo and witnesses his restoration to his Spanish Catholic family. The ornate procession and melodramatic recognition scene provide a fitting conclusion to a —60→ romance narrative in which the protagonists' love and religious faith triumph over all obstacles and adversity.
Isabela and Ricaredo adhere to the schematic, archetypal
perfection of the heroines and heroes of romance, but Cervantes has clearly
chosen to develop their spiritual purity as lovers and as upholders of the
Catholic faith above all other aspects of their respective natures. The author
portrays Isabela as a celestial being, a Marian figure with superhuman powers
to move, inspire, and persuade. On her way to meet the English sovereign,
Cervantes transforms the protagonist into an icon of the Queen of Heaven, an
object of adoration carried through the streets on a float whose
«miraculous beauty» strikes the public dumb with amazement:
«con su gallarda disposición y milagrosa
belleza se mostró aquel día a Londres sobre una hermosa carroza,
llevando colgados de su vista las almas y los ojos de cuantos la
miraban»
(54). Her Spanish attire
underscores Isabela's earthly nationality, while the pearls and diamonds that
drape her figure endow her with the precious, noumenal glow of the divine, set
her apart from and above the masses, and complete the image of a Catholic
religious procession that has suddenly, magically materialized in the middle of
Protestant England. Cervantes advances the heroine's transfiguration at court.
When Isabela learns Ricaredo must leave her to prove his worth with valorous
and lucrative deeds, she metamorphoses into a lachrymose Madonna like Sevilla's
Virgen de la Macarena: «comenzó a
derramar lágrimas, tan sin pensar lo que hacía y tan sesga y tan
sin movimiento alguno, que no parecía sino que lloraba una estatua de
alabastro»
(58). In accordance with
Platonic tradition, the external perfection of Isabela accurately reflects her
inner virtue and wisdom. Her beautiful form provides a suitable corporeal
vessel for a heavenly, melodic voice: «en lo
que tuvo extremo fue en tañer todos los instrumentos que a una mujer son
lícitos, y esto con toda perfección de música,
accompañándola con una voz que le dio el cielo tan extremada, que
encantaba cuando cantaba»
(49108). This divine, musical voice confirms Isabela's
spiritual kinship with a member of her family introduced in the second part of
La española inglesa, a cousin
«única y extremada en la
voz»
, a nun in the convent of Santa Paula whose
religious avocation seems to presage the heroine's destiny (87). Significantly,
this audible, if intangible link between the human and the divine extends to
the extraordinary rhetorical skills of Isabela. As the Spanish captive prepares
for her audience with the Queen, Catalina expresses
—61→
concern that
Isabela will inadvertently reveal the family's illicit religious beliefs. The
heroine calmly asserts her faith that God will gift her with words that will
save and bring honor to her adopted parents: «'yo confío en el cielo que me ha de dar palabras en aquel
instante, por su divina misericordia, que no sólo no os condenen, sino
que redunden en provecho vuestro'»
(53).
The heroine celebrates the capacity of language to unite people across cultural
and religious boundaries when used in the service of universal Christian
values. She envisions herself as one who recognizes the spiritual potential of
language and as one who with God's grace can wield words as unifying
instruments. Isabela clearly shares this aspect of her faith with her Spanish
creator. She uses her ability as a linguist on several occasions to expand the
community of listeners to include members of hostile countries and cultures.
She serves as interpreter for her Spanish parents during their audience with
Queen Elizabeth, who honors the Catholic Spaniards as cherished guests.
Ricaredo entrusts her with the Spanish narration of his story of captivity to
the crowd in Sevilla because he acknowledges the complexity involved in the
telling of a tale of conversion and adversity that spans countries, cultures
and religions. In short, «era mejor fiarlo de
la lengua y discreción de Isabela»
(94). In her role as communicator and intermediary in a secular
context, the heroine resembles the Virgin Mary at work as the advocate for
humankind in heaven.
Despite the aura of divinity that surrounds Isabela, Cervantes
resists the impulse of romance to apotheosize her completely. Instead he
submits the heroine to a series of trials that prove her essential humanity
even as they hone and evince exceptional, abiding love and genuine religious
devotion. Her captivating beauty inspires adoration and spiritual conversion,
but it also arouses Arnesto's all-too-human lust and the jealous resentment of
a number of Queen Elizabeth's ladies-in-waiting. The tender emotions she
displays towards Ricaredo and both sets of parents locate her on an earthly
plane, as does her flesh-and-blood susceptibility to poison. Yet precisely at
this peripetal point in the story, Isabela's dual nature comes to the fore. The
royal physicians save the protagonist with a supernatural antidote-powders made
from the unicorn's horn. Myth appears to invade and supersede verisimilitude in
this instance, marking the narrative's move towards romance conventions, and
metonymically reaffirming the heroine's association with the qualities
traditionally identified with this magical creature, namely virginity,
sovereignty, and Christian salvation. Nevertheless, it is plausible that here
too Cervantes has elected to combine an extratextual, historical reference more
accessible to his contemporary
—62→
readers with the literary
conventions of romance. When James VI of Scotland succeeded Elizabeth I to the
throne, the unicorn from the Scottish royal coat of arms joined the lion in
supporting the English shield in heraldic representations. The peaceful
reconciliation of the lion and the unicorn, formerly enjoined in battle,
ushered in a new, hopeful era of Spanish-English relations ripe with the
promises of peace109. In this context, Isabela's
resurrection from the dead becomes an almost allegorical instantiation of an
imaginary global realm in which England and Spain, previously mired in bloody
conflict, would enjoy harmonious coexistence. Still the English Spanishwoman
faces an even greater test of her mettle when she returns to Sevilla to
confront extraordinary adversity in the form of a two-year separation from
Ricaredo and the devastating report of his death. The constancy of her love and
Catholic faith provides the heroine with sufficient strength to lead an
exemplary life and withstand the blows of fate that would lead others to
despair. While awaiting Ricaredo, she ignores numerous aspiring suitors and
embraces the ascetic existence of a postulant preparing to take final vows
(Pabón 65): «procuraba vivir de manera
que cuando Ricaredo llegase a Sevilla antes le diese en los oídos la
fama de sus virtudes que el conocimiento de su casa... todo lo libraba en su
recogimiento y en sus oraciones y buenos deseos esperando a Ricaredo»
(88-89). The Isabela who encounters Ricaredo
at the convent door has undergone a process of spiritual purification, an
examen de conciencia that leads to a
marriage sanctioned by the Catholic Church, replacing both her illegitimate,
secret ceremony in England and her planned union with God as a cloistered nun,
and returns her to the social fabric of life in post-tridentine Spain.
The two saintly individuals reunited at the convent door in
Sevilla meet as spiritual equals. Like his beloved, the man who weds Isabela in
Spain has been tested and tempered by misfortune. The Trinitarian habit he
wears symbolizes the purgative trials he has survived as a Christian prisoner
in Moorish hands (Pabón 59110). Even as a youth, however,
Ricaredo displays «mucha virtud... gran valor
y
—63→
entendimiento»
(50). This early promise blossoms when Ricaredo reaches manhood
and humility before his beloved and before God forms an integral part of his
heroism. Torn between his potentially conflicting obligations to Isabela,
Church, and Queen, Ricaredo places himself in God's hands before setting sail
to prove himself worthy of the English Spanishwoman: «en su corazón pedía al cielo le deparase ocasiones
donde, con ser valiente, cumpliese con ser cristiano, dejando a su reina
satisfecha y a Isabela merecida»
(59).
The perfect combination of virtue, wisdom, and Christian mercy helps Ricaredo
to attain those goals. The male protagonist faces a more severe test of
character when Isabela loses her beauty, but he passes it with flying colors by
remaining steadfast in a love that surpasses physical attraction:
«el amor que la tenía pasaba del cuerpo
al alma, y que si Isabela había perdido su belleza, no podía
haber perdido sus infinitas virtudes»
(81-82). He subsequently consecrates that avowal of love in the
secret wedding ceremony that initiates his two-year separation from the
heroine. This time when Ricaredo departs London, he does so in response to the
demand of a higher authority than Queen Elizabeth. The Virgin Queen of Heaven,
vested in Isabela, has inspired the hero's
examen de conciencia in matters of
faith, which sends him to Rome to perfect his religious practices. By his own
admission, Ricaredo is somewhat of a lapsed Catholic («'la cual [la fe católica] si no está en la entereza
que se requiere'»
, he confesses to Isabela as he makes
his marriage vows (83), but once in Rome he reconfirms his faith and undergoes
an experience akin to conversion. The strength he derives from this spiritual
reaffirmation sustains the hero through Arnesto's attempt on his life and his
ritual death as a captive in Algiers. The fact that the Trinitarian order pays
his ransom and restores him to life and love in the Catholic community of
Sevilla indicates that God has taken part in arranging this joyful recognition
scene.
Yet something unexpected happens to
La española inglesa on the journey to
the convent door. As Cervantes accommodates the world of Counter-Reformation
Spain to the schemata of romance, he does so in a fashion that undermines the
polarized universe he appears to set up in the opening scenes of the
novela. As a result, readers'
expectations regarding the boundary-crossing between the extratextual world and
the literary text in the fictionalizing act are dramatically altered, skewed in
a way that encourages them to take a searching look at their own values and
faith. Iser has termed the transgression of conventional patterns
«text play»
and has identified it as a characteristic of
«the interplay between the fictive and the imaginary»
—64→
essential to the continuity of literary tradition and to opening
the text and established genres to «new symbolization»
(256).
As a general rule, romance relies on plot rather than
characterization for dramatic tension. Such narratives usually unfold as games
of
agon, as a series of contests in which good
eventually triumphs over evil (Frye 49-54; Iser 258-59). In
La española inglesa, however,
Cervantes has refused to construe
agon along the predictable lines of battling
nations, religions, and cultures. He chooses instead to fictionalize against
the grain of popularly held thoughts and opinions, neutralizing their
conflictive, polarizing potential. For example, the author does not
characterize the kidnapper Clotaldo as a cruel, firebreathing English heretic,
but rather as a warm and caring husband and father, as well as a respected
nobleman devoted to the Crown. As it turns out, Clotaldo and his family are
closet Catholics who remain true to their faith despite the considerable threat
to their wealth, reputation, and lives if that secret should come to light. The
English family provides Isabela with love, material luxury, and the education
of a fine lady. They accept her as their future daughter-in-law, even though
there are more suitable, advantageous matches for their son. Cervantes goes to
great lengths to extend this same humane viewpoint to the rest of Clotaldo's
countrymen, without condemning them on the basis of nationality or religion.
The narrator labels the poisoning of Isabela «una de las mayores crueldades que pudo caber jamás en
pensamiento de mujer principal, y tanto como ella lo era»
(80). He judges the woman and the act on moral grounds, as a
deed that belies the nobility of the lady's social station, but he does not
link the crime to her country or religious practices. Cervantes paints a
similar picture of her son Arnesto, portraying him as a lascivious, arrogant
firebrand, a monster unacceptable to all civilized, moral people, whatever
their background.
The substitution of moral for political correctness emerges most strikingly in the presentation of Queen Elizabeth I. Rather than the evil foil, wicked witch, or at the very least, the powerful adversary Spanish readers might expect, Cervantes gracefully executes some literary sleight of hand to transform the monarch into a fairy godmother. The English sovereign tests, aids, and rewards the hero and the heroine, inadvertently (in the human, but not the divine sense) putting in motion the forces that will eventually reunite the protagonists in Spain under the auspices of the Catholic Church. Like her young Spanish double, she becomes a Marian figure, a fictional realization of her popular image as the Virgin Queen. The Cervantine Elizabeth also possesses great moral perspicacity. She, too, regards Isabela's beauty with wonderment, but sees through appearances to —65→ the heroine's virtue. The Queen remains true to her own values as well. She keeps her promises, even when pressured to go back on her word, and metes out punishment to fit the crimes, but in penalties that are just and tempered by mercy and judicious restraint. After the poisoning incident, she compensates all parties for their material losses and assures Isabela and her parents safe passage to Spain.
In fact, Cervantes has undertaken a daring experiment in
La española inglesa, undercutting
agon on the most conventional, superficial
level of the text, only to reconstitute it as
agonic play occurring within the confines of
the protagonists' soul, but projected outward in words and deeds. Symbolic
psychological conflict displaces dramatic tension as the dynamic, driving force
of this narrative, a Cervantine version of the genre known for flat,
dimensionless characterization. The author concentrates on one aspect of their
personality in particular, their exercise of free will -an ideological
flashpoint of Reformation Europe. When Ricaredo the corsair comes upon the two
Turkish ships of Arnaute Mamí, the description of the ensuing naval
battle offers everything an adventure-seeking reader could possibly want in
terms of swashbuckling, armed confrontation at sea. The hero displays the
requisite strength and valor in the struggle, but his magnanimous show of
Christian mercy towards the vanquished stands in marked contraposition to his
newfound image of valiant soldier, justly waging war on the enemies of the
Crown. Narrative attention shifts from details of the battle to the difficult
decision-making process Ricaredo faces regarding the fate of the Spanish
prisoners, formerly captives of the Turks, and the few live, remaining members
of the Turkish crew. He rejects the suggestion to slay them all, judging that
idea an act of cruelty unworthy of his noble heart and a moral betrayal of the
victory God has brought them. Ricaredo decides to set the prisoners free and
generously supplies them with sufficient money and provisions to make it back
to their respective homelands. His choice does not meet with unanimous support:
«algunos le tuvieron por valiente y
magnánimo y de buen entendimiento. Otros le juzgaron en sus corazones
por más católico que debía»
(64). Still this exercise of free will brings him nothing but
favor from the Queen. Similarly, Ricaredo tries to avoid conflict with his
sworn enemy Arnesto by refusing to fight a duel with him. Furthermore, he
actually argues against harsh castigation of the treacherous lady-in-waiting,
against punishment that his sovereign offers to him as retribution for the
poisoning of Isabela: «Muchas cosas dijo
Ricaredo a la reina disculpando a la camarera y suplicándolo la
perdonase, pues las disculpas que daba eran bastantes para perdonar mayores
insultos»
(82). Ricaredo willingly
serves as an instrument
—66→
of Christian mercy, charity, and
forgiveness, turning down both opportunities for what most would consider
righteous revenge. Readers might also expect a confrontation between Isabela
and the Queen over religious differences, yet such an incident never
materializes. The heroine guards her English family's religious secret, but she
remains a firm and forthright adherent of the Catholic faith, refusing to
succumb to political expediency to promote herself at court. The Queen actually
regards Isabela's open devotion to Catholicism and her repeated refusals to
convert with great respect: «la estimaba en
más, pues tan bien sabía guardar la ley que sus padres la
habían enseñado»
(80).
When Cervantes undermines readers' expectations of historical and
political correctness, he transposes
La española inglesa into a
surprisingly different, more spiritual key. Dramatic tension unfolds as a
series of soul-searching moral dilemmas resolved in acts of free will that both
reaffirm Catholic faith and support a Christian ideology that transcends
national and sectarian divisiveness. Cervantes thus skillfully blends the play
of
agon in the text with that of
alea, which involves submission to a higher
power (Iser 258-59). In this
novela, the protagonists submit their
fate to God and Christian values rather than public policy and prejudice. As a
result, the author reconfigures a simple tale of kidnapping as a classic
narrative of «kidnapped romance»
, described by Northrop Frye
as the genre's absorption «into the ideology of an ascendant
class»
(57). Yet in
La española inglesa's carefully
orchestrated transposition of romance conventions, Cervantes discloses an
«as-if» world that runs counter to the standard ideology of the
time, implicitly articulating an Erasmian plea for religious tolerance and
moderation that flies in the face of the religious wars dividing Christian
Europe. Erasmian thought creates in the narrative what Thomas Pavel has termed
an «epistemic path», a moralizing construct that enables Cervantes
to generate for his readers a utopian vision of a united Christian community in
which archenemies Catholic Spain and Protestant England peacefully coexist111.
Cervantes has chosen what might at first seem two highly unlikely motifs as «ontological founders», imaginative markers that reveal an Erasmian legacy of Christian brotherhood in a utopian, transnational community (Pavel 110). The detailed recounting of international money exchange, transfer of funds, and deposits in foreign banks has long been regarded as one of the most puzzling features of this story112. Readers do perhaps learn more financial minutiae than they ever knew or ever wanted to know in the description of the movement of Isabela's money from England to Spain by way of France, and of Ricaredo's deposit of funds with a Florentine merchant to recover later in Spain. The money motif is far from a compositional flaw, however, for it celebrates the belief Cervantes shared with Erasmus that Christians should demonstrate their faith in daily life, in good works and acts of charity (Castro 294-95, 299; Bataillon 793-95). The financial network established in the tale defies political and religious taboos to constitute a European economic community whose funds make whole a scattered Catholic family, bringing an English, ostensibly Protestant, gentleman into the fold, and restoring all of them to their rightful place at the heart of one of Spain's most active religious communities, Sevilla. In a circuitous route that mirrors the narrative's twisted progress, the money that transgresses commercial sanctions as it crosses national borders is gradually transfigured into an instrument of Christian charity that ransoms the devout Ricaredo from the Moors and returns the flesh-and-blood icon Isabela to the sanctuary of a Spanish convent. Such a constructive, unifying spiritual investment stands in marked contrast to the expenditure of vast sums of money to wage bloody religious wars pitting Christian against Christian.
—68→ The author also counters historical strife with the utopian model
of the Christian family, a social ideal which he approaches in a somewhat
different manner in
La gitanilla (Forcione,
Humanist 96-157). In Isabela's realization of
this ideal, Cervantes challenges readers to undergo their own
examen de conciencia, question common
prejudices, and imagine a world in which an English Spanishwoman and a Spanish
Englishwoman can actually be one and the same person. When the protagonist
returns to Spain, she maintains contact with Clotaldo and Catalina. The heroine
considers them her other set of parents: «escribieron a Clotaldo y a su señora Catalina
llamándolos Isabela padres, y sus padres,
señores»
(88). Love eliminates
all boundaries, creating an extended, cohesive, international family as
Isabela's English parents write «cosas de mucho
amor y de muchos ofrecimientos. A la cual carta respondieron con otra no menos
cortés y amorosa que agradecida»
(88). As a result, those who inhabit the fictional world of
La española inglesa seem simply to be
human beings capable of good and evil, who are endowed with the ability to see
and choose between the two. The closely knit, if farflung, members of this
story's family inspire the reading public to emulate their communal model in
acts that will heal the wounds of a divided Europe, bridge the spiritual
schism, and transfigure the current, war-torn populace into the united
Christian brotherhood just glimpsed on an imaginary, visionary plane of their
collective consciousness.
Yet for all the bumps, turns, and detours along the way, in La española inglesa all roads eventually and inevitably lead to Spain and back to the Catholic Church. While voicing support for religious tolerance, the tale also provides an eloquent defense of Catholic dogma. The happiness and success that Isabela and Ricaredo find at the end arise from the proper exercise of free will, with fortitude, courage, love, faith, and Divine Providence to sustain them in adversity and offer counsel in their hour of need. Their choices constitute acts of devotion that produce exemplary lives richly rewarded by God. The celebration of religious icons, pageantry, and miracles -another ideological battleground of Reformation Europe- firmly aligns Cervantes with post-tridentine policy. This matter, however, is at the same time both a simple and complex one. The implied author who casts a scornful, critical, Erasmian eye on the perverse cofradía of Monipodio in Rinconete y Cortadillo clearly regards false religious practices as grotesque travesties of true devotion. La española inglesa shifts to the opposite end of the spectrum, offering an exemplum of sincere spiritual praxis, and perhaps more importantly, teaching the public how to read and interpret icons, pageantry, and —69→ miracles correctly113. The protagonists, as usual, instruct by example. Ricaredo appreciates his beloved's heavenly beauty, but he recognizes her appearance is a symbolic shell, a physical embodiment of inner virtue. The hero shows that the beauty of icons should not inspire idolatry, but rather stimulate the soul to devotion by means that escape the bounds of rational comprehension and syllogistic logic. Isabela's loss of beauty tests his understanding of that fact, and strengthens his love and faith in her and what she represents. As a follower of the cult of Isabela, or the cult of the Virgin, he elects to confirm and perfect his faith on a pilgrimage to Rome:
| (95) | ||
Having received the gaze of genuine love directed at her by the eyes of Ricaredo's soul, Isabela renews her faith in a similar manner with frequent prayers and visits to the convent.
Cervantes consecrates his
novela in a climactic scene of
anagnorisis, rendering Ricaredo's timely return from the dead as a miracle
witnessed by the entire population of Sevilla, the archbishop's representative,
the magistrate, and by the readers, who join the panoply of the religious
procession. Although the protagonists of this divine drama, one garbed in a
Trinitarian habit and the other dressed as the Queen of Heaven, occupy
centerstage, the dazzling splendor surrounding God's sudden manifestation in
human affairs links all spectators in enraptured wonderment and suspension of
rational thought: «Todas estas razones oyeron
los circunstantes, y el Asistente y vicario, y provisor del arzobispo, y de
oírlas se admiraron y suspendieron»
(93). The crowd's amazement only grows as Ricaredo recounts his
experiences and provides evidence to document the miracle: «'Lo que queda por ver son estos recaudos, para que se pueda tener
por verdadera mi historia, que tiene tanto de milagros como de
verdadera'»
(98-99). To convince
whatever skeptics
—70→
might remain, Ricaredo's Florentine moneychanger
pops up on cue, an occurrence that the narrator assures the public
«ordenó el
cielo»
and that adds «admiración a admiración y espanto a
espanto»
(99). Convinced of the validity
of the miracle, ecclesiastical authorities charge Isabela with writing the
history of the event for the Church records, thus associating chronicler and
manuscript with the permanence and consequence of holy scripture. The crowd
responds by recognizing God's responsibility for the wondrous happenings and by
praising him in an act of communal devotion: «rompió en dar alabanzas a Dios por sus grandes
maravillas»
(99). A glittering display
and heartfelt testimonials pay tribute to God's infinite wisdom, which lies
beyond the reach of human understanding.
At the end of
La española inglesa the narrator
executes another jolting change in frame of reference, returning readers to the
historical present with a startling comment on the location of Isabela and
Ricaredo's current dwelling and mention by name of the man from whom they
purchased the house. The reader / spectator has just vicariously seen and
experienced the
admiratio technique, the
«sudden shift of focus which gives the reader a fleeting awareness of
the work's otherness before the illusion settles in again around his adjusted
scale of values»
in the miraculous recognition scene, only to be
reminded again by a matter-of-fact narrator of a reality in which the English
sack Cádiz on a regular basis, Arnaute Mamí takes people like
Miguel de Cervantes hostage, and Christians fight Christians (Ife 88). Here the
ever experimenting Cervantes treads dangerously close to breaking the illusion
of fiction, but in pushing
admiratio as far as it will go, he
masterfully maximizes the aesthetic and moral impact of the entire tale on the
reader, realizing to its fullest imaginary potential the transgressive process
of disclosure. The author has cued us in the miracle play that like the
audience of
sevillanos, we should suspend
disbelief and rational thought, and give in to the rapture of Christian
romance's spiritual spectacle. In this light, the historical allusions serve as
familiar signposts of the waking world in the midst of the romance dream,
creating rifts in the fictive continuum or imaginary portals that permit
Cervantes to expand the sacral space of the text into the readers' alcove, and
that allow readers to see new realms of possibility in which English
Protestants and Spanish Catholics can be reunited in the community of Christian
brotherhood. This utopian vision may very well reflect the promises of peace
identified with the England of the Stuarts, but it just as accurately captures
the hopes and dreams born of the author's most profound
—71→
Christian
values114. The points at which dream and sentient worlds touch
and merge in the narrative inspire readers to identify with the
novela, rethink their own values and
beliefs, and embrace Cervantes's idyllic notion of a global Catholic community.
In the last paragraph of the story, Cervantes widens the circle of his audience
even further:
| (100) | ||
The pronoun nos draws narrator, implied author, and readers together in La española inglesa's blend of fiction and facticity, stressing the universal nature of the moral imparted. Although the association of beauty and virtue obviously refers to their perfect Platonic combination in Isabela, and to her special ability to unite people across seemingly impenetrable barriers, the observation applies equally well to the narrative itself, a precious verbal icon endowed with a unique spiritual capacity to transfigure humankind. Cervantes has demonstrated in this work that writing and reading are devotional activities, Communal / communal acts of faith that unify souls through the magic of sincere, divinely inspired words. Finally, in a chiastic phrase that echoes the entanglement-disentanglement structure repeated so often in the text, the author reminds us that the ways of God remain inscrutable to mortals here below, and that just as Isabela's kidnapping initiated an enigmatic, heavenly plan that served a higher purpose, so too does an individual's or a nation's experience with adversity form part of an as yet unrealized mysterious holy plan that will ultimately bring peace, prosperity, and brotherhood to all people who face that adversity with fortitude forged by faith. In this sense, La española inglesa attests to Cervantes's devotion to Erasmian ideals, the Catholic Church, the concept of a Christian community, and to the power of imaginative literature and imaginary worlds to move, inspire, and uplift humankind.
—72→Bataillon, Marcel. Erasmo y España: Estudios sobre la historia espiritual del siglo XVI. Trans. Antonio Alatorre. 2nd ed. Mexico City: Fondo de Cultura Económica, 1966.
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