Image and Illusion in Early Modern Spain - Duke University

Pedro de Camprobín La muerte visitando al caballero (c.1660)

A couple of you asked me what is it that I am presenting here at Duke University today. Fair question! Here is the abstract of the paper I am delivering later today. I have also added a couple of visuals so that you can better understand what I am proposing.

The Dream of Olmedo: Trophies of Vanity in Lope, Pereda and Camprobín

Harry Vélez-Quiñones
The University of Puget Sound

«La Muerte es como una vieja cortesana que anduviera por cruces y caminos a la búsqueda de obligados compañeros de viaje…»
Memento mori

Read most often in the context of tragedy, Lope de Vega’s El caballero de Olmedo (1623) reveals itself as a different kind of fantasy when viewed through the prism of vanitas. As tragedy, it is simply the case that don Alonso’s hubris leads him to his undoing. His adamant pursuit of doña Inés in Medina, when he is but a forastero from Olmedo, sets him on a fatal course against forces that he is not able to control. Commentators have highlighted the hero’s pride and arrogance, yet seldom have readers or viewers been invited to envision don Alonso’s self-image. That is, how exactly should we visualize this small-town hidalgo? What is it that moves him to act in such a reckless fashion? What is it that he sees in himself that the play does not quite show us? Moreover, how is it that a young lady as well positioned as doña Inés should fall for a stranger such as Alonso? Surely she most see in him something extraordinary that other suitors lack. This paper aims to fill this visual void by proposing that we read El caballero de Olmedo in the context of early modern representations of the vanitas theme in painting. Antonio de Pereda’s Desengaño del mundo o Sueño del caballero (c.1650-55) and Pedro de Camprobín’s La muerte visitando al caballero (c.1660), among other works, can help us understand the particular construction of masculinity at work in Lope’s play. Don Alonso’s penchant for collecting trophies that exemplify his vanity leads him to a final acquisition, that “vieja cortesana que anduviera por cruces y caminos a la búsqueda de obligados compañeros de viaje…”

Antonio de Pereda, Desengaño del mundo o Sueño del caballero (c.1650-55)