De locos fingidos a locos alegóricos (en Lope y Fernández de Lizardi)
abstract
Faced with a peculiar play such as Todos contra el Payo y el Payo contra todos (attributed to Jose Joaquin Fernandez de Lizardi), with its plot development in an insane asylum in New Spain, we might suppose that the author was influenced by Lope de Vega and his comedy Los locos de Valencia, which also takes place in a similar institution. Actually, we witness a continuity of practices from one setting to the other – Spain the metropolis, and New Spain the colony –, beginning with the feast dedicated to the mad community on the Day of the Innocents. The similarity, however, ends there, because the two plays belong to different dramatic traditions, Lizardi’s a comedia de figurones with baroque traits, and Lope’s a typical comedia de enredo whose principal characters merely feign their insanity.
Keywords: Baroque comedy • Insane asylums • Madmen • Fernández de Lizardi • Lope de Vega
permalink: http://doi.org/10.14277/6969-163-8/RiB-5-57