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Bulletin of the Comediantes, Volume 56, Number 2, 2004, pp. 367-385

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DOI: 10.1353/boc.2004.0014

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http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/boc/summary/v056/56.2.martin.html

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THE PLAY OF ILLUSION IN

CERVANTES'S INTERLUDES

VINCENT MARTIN

University of Delaware
All of us, then, men and women alike, must fall in with

our role and spend life in making our play as perfect as

possibleto the complete inversion of current theory.
Plato, Laws 803c

As a curtain raiser to the reading of his interludes,1 Cervantes flaunts

his play of illusion through an ironic reference to a non-extant, never
completed, or perhaps wholly illusory comedia titled El engao a los
ojos. The joke, of course, is on the reader: the "historical" or "verisimi-

lar" prologue is part of the "act," part of the "engao a los ojos,"2 and we
should take the writer's prefatory remarks on theater with a grain of salt.3
Although this play element and its underlying concept of "illusion" clearly serve as a theoretical support for all theater, what we find in Cervantes's interludes is a masterful blend of these ludic ingredients that come
together to stage forms of reality that reflect the social imaginary of seventeenth-century Spain as well as the human condition.
In a provocative essay on Cervantes's interludes, Anne Cruz has effectively argued that these short pieces "cannot entirely break away from the
normalizing roles assigned to theatrical production by seventeenth-century Spain's social systems. Their indeterminacy notwithstanding, the
entremeses remain, in the end, only partially successful in deferring cul367

368BCom, Vol. 56, No. 2 (2004)

turai authority and control" (120). The assumption here, of course, is that
deferring cultural authority and control is Cervantes's artistic goal. But
does Cervantes actually wish to break away from the established genre or
rather master it, and thereby receive public acknowledgement (i.e., fame)
of this mastery, la Lope de Vega? In light of this critical stance, and
despite the caution necessary for reading Cervantes's prologue, I suggest
that we keep in mind the author's following claim: "fui el primero que
representase las imaginaciones y los pensamientos escondidos del alma,
sacando figuras morales al teatro con general y gustoso aplauso de los
oyentes" (58-59). Rather than the deferment of cultural authority and control, this "gustoso aplauso" seems to have been Cervantes's true goal,4
which, not coincidentally, matches Lope's objective as spelled out six
years earlier in his Arte nuevo de hacer comedias en este tiempo:
y escribo por el arte que inventaron
los que el vulgar aplauso pretendieron,
porque, como las paga el vulgo, es justo
hablarle en necio para darle gusto. (Rozas 182)

Johan Huizinga's classic study Homo Ludens: A Study of the Play

Element in Culture5 stresses a point that seems to underscore Cervantes's
aesthetic project, and which often seems to be overlooked by our con-

temporary critical interests, namely, that play is an end unto itself and not
a means to another end; it is the "fun-element that characterizes the

essence of play" (3). Huizinga highlights the "limitedness" of play: "It is

'played out' within certain limits of time and place. It contains its own

course and meaning"; in this sense, play is "an interlude in our daily
lives" (9). Huizinga's "limitedness" of play is taken a step further by
Victor Turner, who discusses play (and ritual) as "liminality": "In liminality [...] the social order may seem to have been turned upside down,

[...] people 'play' with the elements of the familiar and defamiliarize
them. Novelty emerges from unprecedented combinations of familiar elements" (27). If Cervantes's interludes do not "break away from the nor-

malizing roles assigned to theatrical production" it is because all play, all

games, have rules which establish a sense of order, and this, according to
Huizinga, is a "very positive feature of play: it creates order, is order. Into
an imperfect world and into the confusion of life it brings a temporary, a
limited perfection" (10).

Martin369

The open-endedness of Cervantes's interludes underscores Julin

Maras 's reflection that "Cervantes hace lo que la filosofa har, naturalmente de otra manera: introducir la posibilidad como forma de realidad'
(Cervantes 244). At the same time, this insistence on what Anne Cruz

calls "deferring formal closure" (119) expands the boundaries of the play
as game, for both characters and spectators. The common link to both
notions seems to lie in Cervantes's theatrical (and novelistic) practice of
"illusion" which, as Huizinga points out, is "a pregnant word which
means literally 'in-play' (from inlusio, illudere or inludere)" (11). While
the word ilusin clamors in its absence from Cervantes's texts, the notion

itself clearly shapes both the author's dramatic and narrative writing.
In a brief article that points in the right direction for our undertaking,
Patricia Kenworthy synthesizes Cervantes's interludes thus: "los

entremeses pueden ser considerados como piezas dramticas que dramatizan la creacin del ilusionismo" (235). I suggest that these pieces dramatize the creation of ilusin rather than that of ilusionismo (i.e., prestidig-

itation or magic). Nevertheless, Kenworthy hits the nail on the head by

concluding that Cervantes is an "originalsimo terico de la ilusin como
definidora de la esencia dramtica" (238).
Three years after the publication of Kenworthy's reflections on the
idea of illusion in Cervantes's interludes, Julin Maras published his

Breve tratado de la ilusin, in which the Spanish philosopher illuminates

a blind spot in modernity's comprehension of the uniquely Spanish phenomenon of ilusin, which lies at the very heart of Cervantes's literary
art.6 In his philosophico-philological meditations on the concept of
ilusin, Maras discovers a "positive" sense"el que tiene en expresiones como 'tener ilusin' por algo o por alguien; hacer una cosa 'con
ilusin'" (Breve 15)that is inseparable from the traditional "negative"
(Breve 14) sense of this word, namely, the sense of ilusin as burla,
engao, or sueo, and which ultimately stems from the Latin ludus (Breve
11-15).7 Half of Cervantes's interludes center on the main action of
ilusin as burla or engao? and they are curiously grouped together as
the final four plays of the collection: El vizcanofingido, El retablo de las
maravillas, La cueva de Salamanca, and El viejo celoso.

The plot of El vizcano fingido is the playing-out of a harmless practical joke, a burla or ilusin in the "negative" sense of the word, which has
no ultimate purpose other than the pure joy taken in playing a prank on
women such as Cristina and Brgida: "Cuando las mujeres son como

370BCom, Vol. 56, No. 2 (2004)

stas, es gusto el burlallas; cuanto ms, que esta burla no ha de pasar de

los tejados arriba; quiero decir, que ni ha de ser ofensa de Dios, ni con
dao de la burlada; que no son burlas las que redundan en desprecio
ajeno" (163).9 Since this play begins in medias res, it is not initially clear

if "women like these" refers to the fact that they are prostitutes, typical

victims of pranks, or whether it is a reference to them as deceivers/

pranksters, alluding to some earlier deception/prank to which Solrzano
fell victim, whatever that might have been. As the play progresses, textual evidence points to the latter, and Quiones 's final words serve as a culmination of retaliation and an admonishment to the merry pranksters,
Cristina and Brgida: "todo saldr en la colada" (186).10
Since it is apparent from the text that Solrzano knows his victim but
she does not recognize him, Carroll Johnson's hypothesis of a previous
encounter between Solrzano and Cristina in a coach seems probable:
"on that previous occasion when they enjoyed each other's company, she
removed (at least) the veil covering her face, while he, the visiting gentleman, remained embozado" (16). This would explain the role of money
in this prank; it would also explain the relevance of Cristina's and
Brigida's discussion of the law of 1611, "generally known as the premtica de los coches" (Johnson 7). Whatever the motive behind
Solrzano's prank, Cervantes underscores Cristina's awareness of her
involvement in previous deceptions (ilusin) and her expectation
(ilusin) that her future business dealings, with her face fully revealed,
will be free from all such deceptions: "quitando la ocasin de que
ninguno se llame engao si nos sirviese, pues nos ha visto" (167).
Solrzano convinces his friend Quiones to assist him in the prestidigitation of two chains which will allow him to even the score in his

ongoing "game" with the "ninfa" Cristina: "a pesar de la taimera desta
sevillana, ha de quedar esta vez burlada" (163). If Carroll Johnson's suggestion is correct, Solrzano is giving Cristina a taste of her own medicine, avenging deception with deception, ilusin with ilusin. Central to
the action of this interlude is the "contest" between Cristina and

Solrzano, the Greek idea of agon, which, as Huizinga has underscored,

is "an essential part of the play concept" (30). This notion is driven home
in Huizinga's explanation that "[p]lay is battle and battle play" (41).

Although Solrzano is on the offensive in this "battle" (of the sexes, of

wits), we must keep in mind the fact that his raid is actually an ambush;
Cristina has no idea who he is, nor that she is engaged in combat/play.

Martin371

Solrzano 's first strike takes the form of courtship as play/illusion,

with the inherent sense of amorous language as play/illusion: "ha muchos
das que deseo servir a vuesa merced, obligado de su hermosura, buenas
partes y mejor trmino" (169). Cristina quickly takes up this game and
plays it with him: "Beso a vuesa merced las manos por la que me ha
hecho en acordarse de m en tan provechosa ocasin" (170). Solrzano's
mock seduction of Cristinailusin in the "negative" senseawakens
Cristina's "positive" sense of this term, for it is out of desire that her
hopes and expectations emerge: "El deseo es el mbito en que se engendra la ilusin" (Maras, Breve 61). After the initial flattery of the suave
Solrzano, Cristina and Brgida are subjected to the ridiculous pseudoBasque of the Castilian Quiones as the next step in the language game:
"Vamos que vino que subes y bajas, lengua es grillos y corma es pies"
(179). The illusion of Quiones 's intemperance, which will illusorily lead
to his excessive generosity, seals the deal in Cristina's mind, and she
drops her guard in order to secure the golden chain. Solrzano's prank is
so well planned, predicting in advance the victim's every move, that
Cristina can do nothing but fall into the trap and ultimately recognize that
she has been duped, that the deceiver has been deceived: "Ahora bien, yo
quedo burlada" (186). The fact that Solrzano brings into play the silversmith and the alguacil as unwitting partners in crime only intensifies his
sheer mastery of ilusin, in both senses of the word.
Critics have pointed out the impunity of the two men at the end of the
play, which stands in stark contrast to the mockery endured by the two
women (See Johnson 17 and Canavaggio 366). However, we must not
lose sight of the fact that that is the only logical structure of this prank,
since it is a retaliatory act designed as a way to settle the score in the
game between Solrzano and Cristina. While the men win a dinner, the
women get their just "deserts." Round two is over, but we may not

assume that a truce has been called. As the play begins in medias res, so
too does it end. This structure confirms Anne Cruz's assertion that the

interludes defer "formal closure" (119), since Cervantes has presented to

us a single moment in the continuous, and in this sense "dramatic," play
of illusion in human life. As the interlude begins with the new prank
devised to be played "esta vez" (163), we are led to expect Cristina's
retaliation beyond our frame of vision. In this sense, the reader/spectator

also experiences the "positive" side of ilusin.

In these four pieces that center on a hoax, it is desire that draws the

372BCom, Vol. 56, No. 2 (2004)

double-edged sword of ilusin: desire for material goods and retaliation

{Vizcaino), desire for social status (Retablo), desire for knowledge of the
supernatural (Cueva), and sexual desire (Cueva and Viejo). While Anne
Cruz considers Cervantes's interludes to be caught "within the circularity and deception of desire" (133), Julin Maras shows how ilusin stems
from the psychic life of desire, and he brings to light the dramatic nature
of ilusin. It is worth tracing briefly Marias's discussion of the "positive"
sense of ilusin in order to shed light on this concept so central to
Cervantes's interludes. Marias's first step toward the explanation of the
"dramatic" nature of ilusin is to show what he calls the "condicin futu-

riza" (Breve 40) of ilusin, the "futuricin de la vida humana" (Breve 41),
that is, ilusin as something present that points to something in the
future. 1 ! That pointing toward the future, which has not yet happened and
is therefore not yet real, "introduce una 'irrealidad' en la realidad humana,

como parte integrante de ella, y hace que la imaginacin sea el mbito

dentro del cual la vida humana es posible" (Maras, Breve 40). Here is
where we begin to see the inseparability between the "positive" and "negative" senses of ilusin: "lo que nos ilusiona puede resultar ilusorio; el
objeto de la ilusin puede fallar; a la ilusin la acecha la posibilidad de la
desilusin" (Maras, Breve 41). In El vizcano fingido, Cristina's desire
introduces an unreal element (the chain) into her reality; she counts her
chickens before they are hatched. And indeed, her hopes and expectations
are ultimately foiled; her ilusin is indeed ambushed by desilusin.
Marias's next step is to show the temporal structure of ilusin, as
opposed to desire, "el cual puede tener un carcter momentneo" (Breve

62). Maras explains how ilusin presupposes a past experience that is

conjured up from the imagination in order to appear again as something
new. The result is a mental dj vu, something already seen by the eye of
the mind and summoned to reappear in order to stir up ilusiones (hopes,

expectations, etc.). Since ilusin is a phenomenon made up of both temporal and personal elements, as opposed to the strictly psychic or psychological structure that shapes desire, "aparecen en ella indisolublemente la necesidad de eternidad y la evidencia de que el tiempo seguir

fluyendo y pasando" (Maras, Breve 52). And this temporal structure is

what differentiates ilusin and desire, making ilusin "un acontecimiento
dramtico de la vida humana" (Maras, Breve 52), "un ingrediente o una

posibilidad de la vida personal" (Maras, Breve 63). Ilusin has a dramatic character because it is "algo que le pasa a alguien," while desire,

Martin373

which takes place "en la vida psquica,"12 is merely a "componente no

dramtico de las estructuras dramticas de la vida biogrfica" (Maras,
Breve 63). In El vizcanofingido, Cristina's desire for the chain allows the
prank to be played on her, and this is the "dramatic" element of ilusin to
which Marias is referring. This key psychological factor opens the door
for the action to take place, for Cristina's "positive" sense of ilusin to be
set in motion, although it will ultimately be met by the "negative" sense
and by desilusin.
The inseparability of both senses of ilusin is a fundamental aspect of
Cervantes's treatment of this concept since it creates the structure for the
ludic agon expounded on by Huizinga. In the first four interludes of the
collection, which do not center on a hoax but rather present "una serie de
cuadros" in which "la figura est en funcin del dilogo" (Casalduero
23), there is a clear demarcation of battle lines: between battle-weary
spouses pleading for a truce in the form of divorce (Eljuez de los divorcios); between three prostitutes vying for the services of a recently widowed pimp (El rufin viudo, llamado Trampagos); between a group of
incompetent candidates contending for the position of town mayor (La
eleccin de los alcaldes de Daganzo); and between two second-rate suitors fighting it out for the hand of a servant girl (La guarda cuidadosa). In
the final four interludes that center on a hoax, and in which "la figura est
en funcin de la accin" (Casalduero 23), agonistic limits are also established: between two aristocratic young gentlemen determined to avenge
two deceptive prostitutes (Vizcaino); between two con artists who cheat
innocent country bumpkins for lucrative ends (El retablo de las maravillas); and between a cheating wife and her jealous husband (La cueva de
Salamanca and El viejo celoso). In all eight interludes, one or both sides
have great hopes or expectationsilusin in the "positive" sensethat
may or may not be realized. These hopes and dreams point toward a selffulfillment, toward a self-discovery, a creative act of human reality that is
constantly at work, and constantly at risk of falling into desilusin.
Maras notes that without the ilusiones of human life, understood here
in the "positive" sense, life becomes little more than "un tedioso proceso

rutinario amenazado por el aburrimiento" (Breve 56). This "transcendental" (stricto sensu) feature of illusion makes it virtually synonymous with
both play and theater, and the role of the audience as other is implicitly

highlighted. The structure of Cervantes's play of illusion shapes not only

the dialogues and actions of the author's interludes, but it also serves as a

374BCom, Vol. 56, No. 2 (2004)

theoretical support for much of his narrative fiction. Exemplary in this

regard is Don Quixote's episode with the dukes (Don Quijote II, 30-57),
where the fabrication and manipulation of images and ilusiones, in both
the "positive" and "negative" senses, allow the duke and duchess to sidestep the ever-present threat of boredom as it gives both Quixote and

Sancho hopes and expectations that will ultimately lead to desilusin.

That same manipulation of images and actors, of hopes and dreams, that
same blurring of the lines between actor and spectator, is what holds
together the group of interludes centered on the "negative" sense of
ilusin.

The three remaining plays of our group of "hoax interludes" are similar to Vizcaino with respect to their treatment of the dual concept of
ilusin. Like Vizcaino, which underscores that this spoof is a follow-up to
a previous one, El retablo de las maravillas also refers to an ongoing
series of deceptions, this time actually informing the reader/spectator of
the previous one carried out by the swindlers Chanfalla and Chirinos:
"este nuevo embuste, que ha de salir tan a luz, como el pasado del liovista" (189). This reference is relevant in that it divulges to the audience
the fact that these two con artists pounce on the Achilles heel of shared
social values, in this case, gullibility and superstition, in order to make
their dishonest living. The new hoax consists of the staging of an imaginary puppet show, fashioned by the celebrated and illusory Italian sage
Tontonelo, which only pure Christians and those of legitimate birth will
be able to see: "que ninguno puede ver las cosas que en l se muestran,
que tenga alguna raza de confeso, o no sea habido y procreado de sus
padres de legtimo matrimonio" (191). Once again, the couple seizes
upon the gullibility and superstitions of an ignorant community.
However, in this case, a veritable chink in the social armor is revealed in
the form of the question of honor"la negra honrilla" (200)and the
widespread fear of being considered illegitimate or of an impure lineage"dos tan usadas enfermedades" (192)opens the door to chicanery.
We must not lose sight of the tremendous irony in the fact that the townspeople allow themselves to be turned into puppets in order to uphold their
notion of honor, while the deceptive stage directors, who represent the
face of emerging capitalism, care not a whit for their own honor.
Unlike Vizcaino, where the deception is a reaction to a previous deception and could therefore be considered a justified act of revenge that pits
deceiver against deceiver, the hoax in Retablo depends on the agon of city

Martin375

slickers set against innocent country bumpkins, and the former's thorough understanding of the social imaginary of honor in seventeenth-century (rural) Spain. It is, of course, a cheeky reversal of the locus communis "menosprecio de corte y alabanza de aldea" that sets in motion the
"positive" sense of ilusin through the "negative" sense. The postmodern
notion of "social imaginary," a term coined by Greek-French thinker
Cornelius Castoriadis, is a rather alluring concept through which we may
approach Cervantes's interludes in general, and the Retablo in particular,
since it not only ties in with play and illusion, but also at the heart of this
idea lies the sense of (self-)creation by a community:
I call these significations imaginary because they do not correspond to, or are not exhausted by, references to "rational" or

"real" elements and because it is through a creation that they

are posited. And I call them social because they are and they

exist only if they are instituted and shared by an impersonal,

anonymous collective. (8)

In the case of Retablo, the workings of the social imaginary significations are played out on the intrahistorical stage of the spectators-madeactors who appropriate the creative role of stage director and take the
play/game to an unexpected level of social interaction. In this sense, it is
convenient to keep in mind Charles Taylor's description of the social
imaginary as

the ways in which people imagine their social existence, how

they fit together with others, how things go on between them
and their fellows, the expectations that are normally met, and
the deeper normative notions and images that underlie these
expectations. (106)

Through their seemingly harmless prank, ilusin in the "negative"

sense, Chanfalla and Chirinos dig up and manipulate those "deeper normative notions and images" that underlie communal hopes and expectations, ilusin in the "positive" sense. This is the basic structure of ilusin
of all four "hoax interludes": a weak point in the social imaginary is
attacked (agon) in order that burla may give rise to hopes and dreams. In
the end, however, the "negative" sense of ilusin will reign supreme,

376BCom, Vol. 56, No. 2 (2004)

since this is Cervantes's play with the concept and with the characters of
his interludes. Even in the cases of El retablo de las maravillas, La cueva

de Salamanca, or El viejo celoso, where the victims remain unawareor

at least not fully awareof the prank even at the end of the play, and thus
experience no sense of desilusin, the audience is indeed aware of the

roguery, and this actually intensifies the tragic irony revealed in the
denouement, a structural element that these interludes share with many

tragicomedias of the seventeenth century. What sets Retablo apart is precisely the creative element of the social imaginary underscored by
Castoriadis, the ability of the townspeople not only to witness the marvels
of the puppet show, but also to create those "images that underlie these
expectations" (Taylor 106) and, what is more, to take this ludic imaginary
beyond the established playing field.
The unnamed gobernador of the town proposes that the marvelous
puppet show promised by Chanfalla y Chirinos be staged in celebration
of the afternoon wedding ceremony between his goddaughter Juana
Castrada, daughter of the regidor Juan Castrado, and the unnamed
nephew of the town mayor, Benito Repollo. The prank creates hopes and
expectations; ilusin begets ilusin. After a sardonic discussion of the
fashionable poets/playwrights and the current state of the theater in
Madrid, due to the fact that the gobernadora.k.a. "el Licenciado
Gomecillos" (195)fancies himself a poet (ilusin), the scammers
explain the rules of the game to their dupes. The spectators of the play
within the play are thus given the illusory tools of legitimacy which will
enable them to see the non-existent marvels and to examine their own

questionable consciences. All the fantastic scenes to be staged before the

ingenuous audience play with their deepest sense of fear and desire, emotions which will give way to the dramatic phenomenon of ilusin. The
creative act of making the scenes appear is left to the audience, since the
entire enactment is of course a sham. It is curious to consider at this point

Victor Turner's reflection on the notion of "performance" as "an act of

creative retrospection" and a "'restored' experience," taking experience
as a "willing or wishing forward" (18). This futurition of performance
puts it in line with Marias's previously cited discussion of ilusin; and the
creative function of these concepts underscores their intimate link to the
social imaginary significations at play in this interlude:

Martin377

[Cjreation, as the work of the social imaginary, of the instituting society (societas instituons, not societas institua), is the
mode ofbeing of the social-historical field, by means of which
this field is. Society is self-creation deployed as history.
(Castoriadis 13).
The creative act of the social imaginaryqua societas instituans

produces a new system of notions and images (ilusin) that does not exist
in the previously established social context. In Retablo, this phenomenon
is clearly perceived as a self-creative act, since the townspeople are reliving (and "wishing forward") their own cultural history, their own cultural experience, their own being, through allusions to their system of values and beliefs, and their primal fears. They are creating themselves as
they create the fantastic images, shadows reflected on the screen of their
social imaginary.

Inasmuch as "culture arises in the form of play, that it is played from

the very beginning" (Huizinga 46), the social structure in formation in
this interlude is not merely societas instituans, but also societas ludens.
While the internal spectators are playing their role quite well as architects
of images, they go beyond the borders of the game and break all the rules
by incorporating into their ilusin the quartermaster and the soldiers to be
billeted: "Yo apostar que los enva el sabio Tontonelo" (205). It is in no
way coincidental that "reality" invades the set just as Chanfalla explains
to an increasingly dubious, though ever zealous, group of interactive
spectators that "[fjodas las reglas tienen excepcin" (204). Their serious
play absorbs a character (i.e., the quartermaster) that is not part of the prefabricated set of imaginary puppets to be displayed by Chanfalla and
Chirinos. This transgression signifies the socio-historical "mode of
being" of the townspeople who are eager to discover tangible evidence of
their cohesive normality, their oneness, and of the quartermaster's complete and utter alterity. It is proof of honor as a social construct; and as
such, society as flux must continue to create new images, to (re-)create
itself, through play. The final scene, which recalls the end of the
Maritornes episode in Don Quijote (I, 16)"el gato al rato, el rato a la
cuerda, la cuerda al palo" (227)as well as the pre-Cervantine interludes
that end in fisticuffs, fills everyone except the quartermaster and Rabelin
with the positive sense of ilusin: the townspeople find evidence that
there is someone more illegitimate than they, and the two stage managers

378BCom, Vol. 56, No. 2 (2004)

are filled with the hopes and expectations of tomorrow's repeat performance, this time on a public scale.
The last two "hoax interludes" share the common theme of adultery,

the first through a pre-planned debauch while the husband leaves home to
attend his sister's wedding, and the second through an impromptu scheme
to sneak a man into the house right under the jealous husband's nose. Like
Vizcaino and Retablo, La cueva de Salamanca alludes to a former occa-

sion when Leonarda may have possibly attempted to deceive her husband
Pancracio: "Por Dios, que esta vez no os han de valer vuestras valentas
ni vuestros recatos" (211). And like Retablo, this piece also pits the naive
against the savvy, worldly wisdom against rustic ignorance, and it takes
up the role of superstition in the social imaginary. What is curious is the
fact that in the figure of the student are fused two inharmonious forms of
knowledge, for the celebrated legend of the cave of Salamanca, as a place
where black magic was taught and learned, emerged in the fourteenth
century as a sort of antidote to the material being taught at the city's university (see Egido). Yet the student claims to be both a graduate of the
university"soy graduado de bachiller por Salamanca" (2 1 5)and also
a practitioner of the "ciencia que aprend en la Cueva de Salamanca"
(222).
However, the black magic performed by the clever student is only the
secondary deception, produced ad hoc as a way to allow Leonarda to
escape from the disastrous consequences of infidelity. The initial deception is the one planned out by the cheating wife Leonarda and her lascivious servant Cristina to introduce two mena sexton and a barberand

their hamper full of food into the home once Pancracio has left for his
trip. The hopes and expectations (ilusin) of these two women, anticipated to come about as a result of their deception (ilusin), are quickly suppressed by Pancracio 's unexpected return. This sets in motion the student's quick wit and subsequent deception through which the play reaches its comic climax and reestablishes the order of play into the matrimonial chaos of Leonarda and Pancracio. As Leonarda stalls Pancracio 's

entrance into the house, she quickly dispatches the suitors to a loft full of
coal: "Seores, a recogerse a la carbonera, digo al desvn, donde est el
carbn" (219). At the same time, the student takes cover in a hayloft.
When bales of hay apparently fall on the student, he emerges to dazzle
Pancracio with his talk of black magic, that is, this second deception
(ilusin), this time carried out by the student, gives rise to new hopes and

Martin379

expectations (ilusin), this time in the imagination of the naive husband.

Pancracio 's will to knowledge (ilusin) opens the door for the student to
turn the hiding gentlemen visitors into diaboli ex machina: "No se contentar vuesa merced con que le saque de aqu dos demonios en figuras
humanas, que traigan a cuestas una canasta llena de cosas fiambres y
comederas?" (223). The women object to the demonic plan, fearful that
the student is going to reveal the original deception of infidelity.
Pancracio, however, is intrigued, and he accepts the offer to see devils
and their food, provided that no danger or fright come to anyone in his
house: "si ha de ser sin peligro y sin espantos, yo me holgar de ver esos
seores demonios y a la canasta de las fiambreras" (223). Thrown into the
role of puppeteer, with an audience prepared to behold the marvelous
spectacle, the student, by manipulating the function of superstition in the
social imaginary, now brings the devils out in the form of the sexton and
the barber, their faces blackened by the coal. As a final coup de thtre,
Pancracio agrees to allow the devils to dine with his household and the
student in order that he may continue to hear and see marvels of necromancy. The dinner table is the ultimate symbol of his own cuckoldry
(ilusin) brought about by his will (ilusin) to taste the secret fruit of the
"ciencias que se ensean en la Cueva de Salamanca" (229).
El viejo celoso, the last of the "hoax interludes," also revolves around
the theme of infidelity. In this case, however, the deception (ilusin) is
planned out extemporaneously through Lorenza's conversation with her
neighbor Hortigosa, who sparks a desire in the presumably innocent
young wife and creates hopes and expectations (ilusin) in her imagination. While in Cueva Leonarda simply portrays Pancracio as a nuissance
whom she would rather see not return"All dars, rayo, en casa de Ana
Daz. Vayas, y no vuelvas; la ida del humo" (211)the audience of Viejo
is clearly aware of the reasons for Lorenza's dissatisfaction with her hus-

band. And these reasons, which go beyond his jealousy and suspicions,
are not coincidentally the same as the complaints raised in the first interlude of the collection, Eljuez de los divorcios, a play that not only foreshadows these last two interludes, but also serves as their inevitable
finale.

The extreme jealousy of the putrefying husband Caizares has led him
to lock his young wife away in the house with the hopes and expectations
(ilusin) that she serve as his faithful nurse, and that she never discover
the sexual joys of life. The key that locks her in and which he keeps hid-

380BCom, Vol. 56, No. 2 (2004)

den is, comically, a symbol of the husband's impotence, as Lorenza

unabashedly reveals: "yo duermo con l y jams le he visto ni sentido que
tenga llave alguna" (236). As in Cueva and Juez, marriage is depicted in

this piece as both play and war (agon), a sense of this sacramental contract also pointed out by Huizinga in his study on play: "To archaic man
marriage is a 'contrat preuves'" (83). The present interlude illuminates
the various senses of preuve in the agonistic contract between Lorenza
and Caizares, all of which are overcome by the agile wife and her
Celestinesque neighbor through a bawdy play of innuendo, imagination,
and climax (both sexual and dramatic).
Hortigosa's encroachment across the forbidden threshold of
Caizares's house is a direct result of the old man's senility, whereby he
is doubly the agent of his own undoing, the unwitting cause of the
desilusin of his ilusin: "Milagro ha sido ste, seora Hortigosa, el no
haber dado la vuelta a la llave mi duelo, mi yugo y mi desesperacin"
(23 1). The neighbor next builds up the hopes and expectations in Lorenza
of relieving her frustration and boredom, which we have seen is an essential objective of ilusin: "lo que ha de hacer, hgalo luego, que estoy tan

aburrida, que no me falta sino echarme una soga al cuello, por salir de tan
mala vida" (236). Hortigosa exits, allowing Caizares time to return
home and briefly grill his wife; the neighbor then returns to the couple's
home, this time with the "ginjo verde" (233) concealed behind a piece of
leather embossed with figures of four characters from Orlando furioso,
which Hortigosa pretends she needs to sell in order to bail her son out of
prison (ilusin). Although Caizares has no idea that he is at this very
moment being cuckolded, he nevertheless feels the sting of the "nettlelike" neighbor (ortiga), which marks the shattering of his ilusin, for as
Lorenza tells her neighbor when the play opens: "ste es el primero da,
despus que me cas con l, que hablo con persona de fuera de casa"
(231).

The trick of leading the young lover to the wife's bedroom concealed
behind the embossed leather, while the husband is distracted by the four

male figures who provoke his insane jealousy, underscores the play of
illusion as "engao a los ojos" (63) in all four of these "hoax interludes."
The modernity of this representational praxis anticipates the same game
that Ren Magritte would present in his La trahison des images of 1929,
reminding us that what we see is not a pipe (Ceci ? 'estpas une pipe). By
taking the embossed figures as men in his house, Caizares is blinded to

Martin381

the fact that a real man is actually present, and indeed threatening his
honor. That is, he is betrayed by images. When Caizares loses his temper and throws Hortigosa out of the house, Lorenza feigns anger (ilusin)
and stomps off into her room where Caizares thinks she is pouting, but
where she is actually living out her own ilusin. The audience can only
see the husband and Cristina, but the sounds of Lorenza's discoveries and

satisfaction coming from behind the door signal the culmination of the
wife's ilusin and desilusin: "Ahora echo de ver quin eres, viejo
maldito, que hasta aqu he vivido engaada contigo" (248). The symbolic staging of Caizares outside the door that he is unable to penetrate,
while his wife fulfills her fantasies, creates the climactic tension which is

brought to an apparent anticlimax through a literal "engao a los ojos," as

we see in the stage directions: "Al entrar Caizares, dnle con una baca
de agua en los ojos; l vase a limpiar; acuden sobre l Cristina y Doa
Lorenza, y en este nterin sale el Galn y vase" (249). Lorenza now pretends that her performancein the sense of "creative retrospection,"
"restored experience," "wishing forward" (Turner 18)behind the door
was merely staged to retaliate for Caizares's improper treatment of their
neighbor, and the husband remains unaware of the cuckoldry that has just
taken place in his presence. The play ends with the entrance into the
house of the alguacil, musicians, a dancer, and the neighbor Hortigosa: a
complete desilusin for the jealous old husband whose goal it was to keep
everyone out of his house. And the curtain speech that Lorenza and
Cristina address to the female audience members underscores their

ilusin and a likely reprise:

Doa Lorenza.

Aunque mi esposo est mal con las vecinas, yo

beso a vuesas mercedes las manos, seoras vecinas.

Cristina.Y yo tambin; mas si mi vecina me hubiera trado

mi frailecico, yo la tuviera por mejor vecina; y
adis seoras vecinas. (252)

The fact that the patsies in these last three pieces remain unaware of
the ruses played on them, while the tricks are explicit to the audience,
intensifies the play of ilusin and desilusin, and it signals society's lead
role in its own unraveling. The order of play is momentarily restored at
the end of each of these four "hoax interludes," thus introducing into the

social imaginary "la posibilidad como forma de realidad" (Maras,

382BCom, Vol. 56, No. 2 (2004)

Cervantes 244). Formal closure is indeed deferred, as Anne Cruz has

asserted, and it is because the irreality brought into play by the futurition
of ilusin can never delineate the ultimate limit of ludus. Solrzano and

Cristina (Vizcano) will surely meet up again; Chanfalla and Chirinos

(Retablo) have already expressed their preparation for a repeat performance (ilusin); the student from Salamanca (Cueva) will doubtless pull
another prank on a gullible interlocutor, and Leonarda will most likely
deceive her husband again; and Lorenza and Cristina (Viejo) will certainly invoke again the help of Hortigosa in order to restage a similar deception.

The social imaginary in these pieces consists of an endless series of

hopes and expectations, continually executed through the Cervantine play
of "engao a los ojos." Human desire generates the pregnant concept of
ilusin through play, which presents itself to us as "an interlude in our
daily lives" (Huizinga 9). These burlesque "histories" are cyclical, and we
must see the arrangement of these pieces as a "dramatic" symbol of
regeneration and re-creation that takes us from marital strife that leads to
desire for divorce (ilusin), to infidelity (ilusin), and, implicitly, back
again. They depict that vicious circle of human relationships that James
Joyce described as "a commodius vicus of recirculation" (3). In the last
analysis, Cervantes's interludes represent the never-ending reading/writing of a never-ending action, an ilusin in the "negative" sense that ultimately imbues the reader/spectator with the "positive" sense of this "dramatic" phenomenon.
NOTES

1. Whether or not Cervantes wrote his interludes to be read and not performed, as Nicholas
Spadaccini argues, until recently we have indeed been limited to the act of reading and to the mental
visualization of these pieces. The 2000-2001 season performance ofMaravillas de Cervantes by Els
Comediants may just have been the catalyst for change that contemporary companies needed. The

five pieces gathered and intertwined for this unique spectacle that so brilliantly captured the ludic element of Cervantes's interludes were Los habladores, La cueva de Salamanca, La eleccin de los

alcaldes de Daganzo, El viejo celoso, and El retablo de las maravillas. A roundtable discussion on
this production took place at the ????? Jornadas de Teatro Clsico (Almagro, 2000) and was chron-

icled by Mara ngela Celis Snchez. More recently, in 2004, Els Joglars debuted their stunning and

Martin383

innovative production of El retablo de las maravillas: Cinco variaciones sobre un tema de

Cervantes. We can only hope that this impetus will continue.
2.For a discussion on this same technique in the Prologue to Don Quijote, see Tom Lathrop.
3.As Jacobo Sanz Hermida warns us in his introduction to these short pieces: "no parece del todo
conveniente creer al pe de la letra las palabras declaradas por Cervantes en este Prlogo, sin antes
haberlas tamizado de ese tufillo vehemente que le impulsa a realizar cierto alarde terico sobre la
concepcin del teatro [...], que ha de ser considerado en su justa medida, en parte como un simple
ejercicio ensaystico de carcter retrico, supeditado a unos condicionamientos externos negativos"
(20). Quotations from Cervantes's Entremeses are from Jacobo Sanz Hermida's edition. Page numbers will be indicated in parentheses.
4.In the same prologue, Cervantes writes of these dramatic pieces that he is publishing: "Querra
que fuesen las mejores del mundo"; that adjective would naturally depend on the public's inclination,
and the author invites the reader to be the judge: "t lo vers" (63). Edward H. Friedman has also
pointed out this objective in Cervantes's dramaturgy: "Two factors delineate Cervantes' venture into
drama: his intense desire to succeed as a playwright and his ultimate rejection by a public indoctrinated in Lope's comedia" (15).
5.Huizinga underscores in his foreword to this book that he had repeatedly insisted on the phrase
"the play element of culture" and not "the play element in culture" because, he says, "it was not my
object to define the place of play among all the other manifestations of culture, but rather to ascertain how far culture itself bears the character of play" (i).
6.Juan Luis Surez has discussed this concept in terms of Caldern's dramatic art (212).
7.To define and give examples of this "negative" sense, Marias cites the Vulgate, Alfonso de
Palencia's Universal vocabulario en latin y en romance, Covarrubias's Tesoro de la lengua castellana
o espaola, and the Diccionario de Autoridades (Breve 11-14).
8.For a discussion on pranks in early modern Spain, see Marc Vitse and Monique JoIy.
9.Casalduero notes the lightheartedness of this prank as "muy tpica de Cervantes y que hay que
subrayar para que se vea la diferencia con la picaresca" (203).
10.Sanz Hermida cites the entry for this idiom in the Diccionario de Autoridades: "Frase vulgar que
se dice por aquel a quien se le ha advertido muchas veces no haga alguna cosa mala, y no se enmienda, y como amenaza se le dice que 'todo saldr en la colada'; esto es, que todo lo pagar junto" (186).
1 1 . Maras is unmistakably following Ortega y Gasset, who underscored the predominant role of the
future in human life and coined the term futuricion in Spanish: "No es el presente o el pasado lo
primero que vivimos, no; la vida es una actividad que se ejecuta hacia delante, y el presente o el pasado se descubre despus, en relacin con ese futuro. La vida es futuricin, es lo que an no es" (420).
12.In his sketch of the "psychological" sense of desire, Marias is thinking of the modem philosophers who have discussed desire as one of the passions of the soul, following Descartes's definition
in Article 86 of his Les passions de l'me of 1649: "The passion of Desire is an agitation of the soul,
caused by the spirits, which disposes it to will for the future the things it represents to itself to be suit-

384BCom, Vol. 56, No. 2 (2004)

able. Thus we desire not only the presence of absent good but also the preservation of the present,
and in addition the absence of evil, both what we already have and what we believe we might receive
in time to come" (66).

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