Abstract

El príncipe constante by Pedro Calderón de la Barca is a comedia based on the history of Portugal. It is set in the historical framework of the early expansion of the Portuguese Empire. Following the conquest of Ceuta from the Muslims in 1415, two princes, Enrique and his younger brother Fernando, carry out in 1437 an attack on the Moroccan city of Tangier. The play centers on the captivity of Fernando, brought about by the defeat of the Portuguese. Throughout the play there is a contrast between the development of Fernando’s character and that of other members of his family (Enrique, King Duarte, and King Alfonso). This moral development is forged by the Christian-Muslim territorial conflict. Initially, the King of Fez (who will take Fernando as a hostage) and the Portuguese King Duarte desire to conquer each other’s lands. From the beginning to the end of El príncipe constante, the Muslim King’s ambitions are presented as markedly territorial, with no reference to the spread of Islam. In contrast, throughout the comedia the Portuguese Christians emphasize the desire to expand both their territory and their Faith. El príncipe constant can be seen as a criticism of any Christian conquests clothed in spirituality, but motivated by greed. This will be examined by a study of the main action of the play in light of teachings on the subject of «just war» by two preeminent Spanish theologians of the Golden Age: Francisco de Vitoria and Francisco Suárez.

Abstract

Due to the banning of printing permissions for comedies and novels, the calderonian works lived various years on stage rather before being able to be printed.With the banning over, the vicissitudes that they went through during this period, that is, different performances that lead to different copies of the text depending on the company that had it, erroneous attributions, etc., harmed the poet’s comedies recovery work and, in some cases, diminished the quality of the final printed text.This is seen in the case of El príncipe constante, which closes the Primera parte de comedias (1636) of Calderón. It is an untidy edition which makes the current editor’s work difficult; he will have to turn to other reliable testimonies to rectify the edition’s mistakes in order to provide the reader with a text that is as close as possible to the poet’s hypotetical will.

Abstract

En este trabajo analizamos la influencia del teatro latino y, concretamente, de la obra de Plauto en la producción dramática de Calderón de la Barca; una cuestión que, hasta ahora, apenas ha sido abordada por la crítica. Concretamente, nos centraremos en El príncipe constante, una de las principales piezas del canon calderoniano que, curiosamente, presenta llamativas concomitancias temáticas, formales y relativas a la construcción de caracteres con una conocida obraplautina, Captivi. De esta manera pretendemos, a partir de un mayor conocimiento de las fuentes calderonianas, ahondar en la interpretación de un texto tan fascinante como El príncipe constante.