María de Zayas’s Estragos que causa el vicio and the Feminist Impasse

 

Edward H. Friedman

Indiana University

 

    María de Zayas y Sotomayor (1590–1661) is destined by fate, or, more properly, by gender, to play an emblem­atic role in Spanish literary history. Her twenty novelle, published in two collections, the Novelas ejemplares y amorosas (1637) and the Desengaños amorosos (1647), place her in an almost solitary position among published women writers of seventeenth-century Spain. Although educational opportunities for women were vastly inferior to those available to men, a number of women were avid readers, members of literary academies, and, one can sup­pose, writers. Zayas’s narratives are, fortunately, far more than token objects; they are brilliantly conceived, engag­ing, and mystifying texts. The writings are, at the same time, controlled by women, most notably by Zayas herself but also by the women of the narrative frame and by fe­male characters within the stories. Men are hardly absent from the picture, however. The intertext and the accom­panying “anxiety of influence” reflect institutions of lit­erature under male dominance. Zayas’s exemplary novels owe their title and their competitive spirit, in large part at least, to Cervantes. The feminine cannot, for better or worse, escape the given of alterity, of subordination to traditional masculine authority. Feminist expression has little alternative but to confront a male power structure. It is not surprising, then, to find in Zayas the images of bat­tle, of conflict, and of victimization, together with a search for means of release. The explicit violence in the novels serves as a marker of reality and as a catalyst of reader response, which may be gender-inflected.

    Estragos que causa el vicio is the last of Zayas’s twenty novelle, the tenth narrative in the second part. It is nar­rated by Lisis, the main character of the frame story, im­mediately prior to the concluding event, the decision by Lisis and all but one of her companions to enter a con­vent. Withdrawal from the secular world to the spiritual realm of the convent is, significantly, a choice made by numerous characters in the stories, including Florentina, the major figure of Estragos que causa el vicio. With re­spect to the comprehensive message systems of the novelle, this is obviously a crucial determination. The act of taking refuge from society, and into the female com­munity of the cloister, carries immense symbolic weight. My focus here will be on the dialectical relation of the final novella and the culmination of the narrative frame. The content of Estragos does not seem to provide the ideological thrust that Zayas could have offered as a link between the literary performance and the real-world ana­logue. The selection of a story that could be deemed counterproductive, in terms of both feminism and internal logic, is meaningful in its own right. The fact that Es­tragos does not lead as comfortably as might be expected to the conclusion of Zayas’s narrative trajectory suggests that the tension is neither arbitrary nor unconscious. Why would the author elect to use this decisive space in the text for an unflattering portrait of women and for what is arguably the novel least dependent on gender per se?

    When one approaches the exemplary novels of María de Zayas, the writer’s signature is difficult to elude. The texts invite the reader to underscore similitude and differ­ence, to judge the feminist re-creation of narrative and of exemplarity. The women of the frame story pursue men and are pursued by them. In the first collection, men and women share narrative duties, while in the second all the narrators are women. The Desengaños amorosos shift radically from the goal of matrimony to retreat to the con­vent. The move can be described as a flight from male domination or as an erasure of men from the parameters of social interaction, essentially a rhetorical distinction between resignation and assertiveness. In order to cir­cumvent violence and abuse, women isolate themselves from the society that bears responsibility for their mis­treatment, which is also the society that allows them to fulfill their roles as wives and mothers. Reclusion will surely afford solace, but this type of redemption may lead to a pyrrhic victory, to self-erasure. In “Feminist Criticism in the Wilderness,” published in 1981, Elaine Showalter addresses what she calls a “current impasse” in the femi­nist enterprise, that is, to problems and contradictions in delineating the object of study. The impasse endures, and is inevitable, I would submit, because feminism is bound to define itself through the conventions that it hopes to transform. While positioned to do so, the plot of Estragos que causa el vicio does not permit a clear transition—a clean break, so to speak—from injustice toward women to the shelter of the convent.

    In the introduction to her story, Lisis refers to the sym­bolic aspects of the narration. She seems to converge with Zayas here, as she admonishes her audience to listen with care, the women so as to be undeluded, desengañadas, and the men to be persuaded not to deceive. Her words become a challenge and a rallying cry:

 

¡Animo, hermosas damas, que hemos de salir vence­doras! ¡Paciencia, discretos caballeros, que habéis de quedar vencidos y habéis de juzgar a favor que las damas os venzan! (Zayas 470)

 

She speaks of the repression of women by men and adds that “os advierto que escribo sin temor” (471; emphasis mine). The introductory commentary, complemented by the frame story and the preceding novelle, establishes a context for the triumphant exit from society and from the patriarchal order. Lisis points beyond the competition of storytelling to the comprehensive vision of the Desen­gaños—the writer’s vision—and to the issue of sexual tyranny, but the immediate context is Lisis’s story, which the reader would expect to coincide with the introduction, and, further, to progress smoothly into the dénouement of the narrative frame. This is not necessarily the case.

    Estragos que causa el vicio consists of two narratives, both involving Don Gaspar, a nobleman who accompa­nies King Philip III to Portugal. In the first story, Don Gaspar enters into an amorous intrigue with a young Portuguese woman, whom he visits secretly at night in order to protect her reputation. One evening near the en­trance to her home he sights the cadaver of a man who has been killed violently. He takes this as an omen and re­fuses to visit the woman again. In the major plot line, Don Gaspar observes two exceptionally beautiful women at mass, and he sets his eyes on one of them, Doña Floren­tina, who proves to be unmarried. Her sister, Doña Mag­dalena, is the wife of the aristocrat Don Dionisio. Gaspar resolves to court Florentina, with his sights on matrimony. One evening, while walking along the street where the two sisters live, he comes across his beloved, covered with blood and close to death. Gaspar accompanies repre­sentatives of the law to the house, where they find about ten bodies, including those of Doña Magdalena, Don Dionisio, and their servants. Florentina, meanwhile, ap­parently on the threshold of death, receives the sacra­ments and confesses. She recovers, nonetheless, and in­herits the estates of her sister and brother-in-law after declaring Don Dionisio, suspicious of the fidelity of his wife, guilty of murder and suicide. Florentina’s true con­fession occurs later, when Don Gaspar, still considering marriage, insists on a detailed account of the events. The embedded narrative reveals that Florentina had fallen desperately in love with Don Dionisio, which he had re­ciprocated during a period of four years. A confessor had consigned her to hell for having sustained the illicit rela­tionship, and, in her moment of despair, she had told a trusted attendant of her plight. The attendant had con­vinced her of the need to murder her sister, and they had carried out a plot wherein Don Dionisio would discover the innocent Magdalena in a compromising position. In a rage, he had killed her and all the household staff. The attendant, remorseful over the disaster she had caused, had admitted her culpability and, along with Florentina, was stabbed by Dionisio before he took his own life. Don Gaspar advised Florentina to enter a convent, from whence she continues to write him. He returned to Spain and married in Toledo. Lisis notes that she heard the story directly from him.

    Doña Magdalena is, of course, a victim of unspeakable cruelty, but those who bring about her death are two other women, Florentina and the attendant. Don Dionisio is but a player in their metadrama. The primary figure of Estra­gos que causa el vicio is not the rich playboy Don Gaspar, who is reduced to the role of narratee and arbiter, but the enchanting Florentina, a woman who gradually exposes her darker side. Like Lázaro de Tormes, Doña Florentina starts her explanation at the beginning, with her birth. Her mother died in childbirth, and her father married a widow with a young daughter. The parents treat the young girls with such love and equanimity that only on her father’s death does Florentina learn that Magdalena is her stepsis­ter. The mother dies shortly thereafter, and the sisters are taken in by her brother, who treats them well. Florentina and Magdalena resist their uncle’s wish for them to enter a convent, and Don Dionisio initiates his courtship of Magdalena. After their marriage, Florentina lives in their home, overcome with grief from the love she feels for her brother-in-law. When Dionisio asks her the cause of her pain, she proclaims her love, and he, in turn, acknowl­edges his love for her. The clandestine affair goes on for four years, during which time Florentina usurps the role of mistress of the household from her sister. She is able to live with herself and with her transgressions until, in a rare confession, she is moved by a priest to fear for her soul. Her act of redemption could hardly be more ironic.

    From the psychological point of view, it is interesting to recognize the apparent inconsistency between Floren­tina’s depiction of her childhood and the emergence of her wayward temperament. Zayas gives herself an open­ing for sibling rivalry, but there is no wicked stepmother, no sinister uncle, no economic cause for friction, no dis­cord between the sisters. The culprit in this instance is love. Florentina’s passion for Don Dionisio is uncontrol­lable. Morality and respect for her sister cannot compete with her desire. Florentina is not so much lured by the nameless attendant as amenable to any recourse that will justify her sins. When the attendant compares her to David ridding himself of Uriah for the love of Bathsheba, she is all too willing to listen. When the attendant con­vinces her that she can repent for any wrong, she immedi­ately agrees to put the scheme into motion. Even after she has been apprised of the catastrophic consequences of the stratagem, Florentina is far from devastated. Her deathbed confession—and one must recall that this is a woman who shudders at the thought of an eternity in hell—incrimi­nates Don Dionisio and, by implication, Doña Magdalena. The attendant is overwhelmed by the effects of her trea­son, while Florentina remains most concerned for her own well-being. Strangely, she enters the penitential mode only indirectly, and in a secular context, in her confession to Don Gaspar. She is reluctant to expand upon her story and does so, it would seem, only in the hope that she may still salvage a match with Don Gaspar. And to further deviate from poetic justice, the forces of earthly justice pardon her for her sins. Florentina is left to live with her conscience within the confines of the cloister, probably without comprehending the enormity of her offense.

    Commenting on her story, Lisis stresses that the major­ity of good women suffer because the relatively small percentage of malevolent women give them a bad name. She regrets to have to add that the number of corrupt women is growing, and, citing examples from the narra­tives, she indicates that virtue alone cannot save women from disaster. She maintains, for example, that “[a] Doña Magdalena no le sirvió el ser honesta y virtuosa para li­brarse de la traición de una infame sierva, de que ninguna en el mundo se puede librar” (508). Lisis names the atten­dant rather than Florentina as responsible for Magdalena’s demise. The theme of male abuse of women becomes secondary to a more generalized survey of the nature of evil, even though this section leads into the retreat to the convent. Lisis does issue a challenge to the men in her audience:

 

Y a los caballeros, por despedida suplico muden de intención y lenguaje con las mujeres, porque si mi defensa por escrito no basta, será fuerza que todas tomemos las armas para defendernos de sus malas intenciones. (509)

 

Her act of rebellion is less aggressive, if equally dramatic. She will join the company of God and her devout sisters in a community that operates in an alternate zone, that excludes men, and that denies value to beauty, wealth, gossip, and the honor code. Defense in this case is not combat but another form of resistance, of protest. Lisis and her comrades seek protection in a holy place, free of the dangers of society. The tales that she has heard, and recited, supply warnings of the treachery that awaits women, and the sanctuary of the convent is her response. To what extent is Estragos que causa el vicio a part of the admonition?

    While Don Gaspar and Don Dionisio may have their flaws, they do not bear the burden of guilt in the narrative. Don Gaspar is rather spoiled, accustomed as he is to regal treatment. He uses his influence to aid Florentina rather than to condemn her. Don Dionisio enters into an affair with Florentina only after she professes her love. Despite his barbarous reaction to what he assumes is Magdalena’s guilt (and his hypocrisy, in light of his four-year affair with her sister), he is ultimately a pawn in the designs of Florentina and her attendant, as much the victim as the perpetrator of evil. Estragos decenters Don Gaspar, the ostensible protagonist, to foreground Florentina as an­tagonist and Magdalena as her prey. To a degree, Zayas appropriates for Florentina what has been, although not exclusively, a masculine space. With her female accom­plice, Florentina becomes the victimizer in a double sense; she does harm to her sister and others, and she damages the reputation of all women. In other words, she belongs to the worst category of women and to the worst (and larger) category of men. The author presents a movement from woman as innocent victim (Doña Ana de Añasco in El traidor contra su sangre, for example) and woman as a rebel against abuse (Doña Blanca in Mal pre­sagio casar lejos, for example) to woman as actor and acted upon. The empowerment of Doña Florentina comes at the expense of her integrity and the integrity of all women. Correspondingly, while her role as narrator ex­pands her authority, nothing in her description of the events justifies the betrayal of her sister. The intervention of the attendant may appear to point away from Floren­tina’s control, but this is merely a screen for her ardent complicity. Perhaps the greatest sin is the false confes­sion, in which the moribund Florentina would have repre­sentatives of God and of earthly justice believe that the tragedy was attributable to her sister and brother-in-law. So much for the salvation of her soul.

    In her novels, María de Zayas reacts to the marginali­zation of women in society and in literature. The publication of the Novelas ejemplares is in itself a sym­bolic act of inscription. Within the narrative structure, the decentering process is impeded somewhat by the un­avoidable intrusion of men, as the enemies of feminine dignity and influence, upon the plots. The innocent victim often has neither control nor a voice, and the manifesta­tion of innocence may call for the death of female char­acters. Doña Blanca in Mal presagio casar lejos is an exception of sorts. She eloquently voices the offenses that she has withstood, but she knows that this will precipitate her death. She resists passivity, but she cannot rewrite the dénouement. In paradoxical fashion, Doña Florentina in Estragos que causa el vicio supersedes these obstacles. She takes command of the dramatic situation, by inform­ing Don Dionisio of her feelings, managing her sister’s household, collaborating in a plan to murder Magdalena, devising a misleading confession as she lies dying, and narrating her story. Just as men go unpunished for their wrongdoing, she escapes retribution. Her refuge in the convent is, in effect, a parody of the events that end the frame story. In her figurative enactment of the male role, Florentina succeeds with respect to domination, social law, and the breaking of silence. It could not have been lost on the writer that she bestows success on a woman who is the antithesis of exemplary. Knowingly or inad­vertently, Zayas projects the dilemma of the female artist onto the text.

    Feminist writing can expose prejudice, critique the status quo, and suggest ways of changing society’s atti­tudes toward women. Zayas seems to anticipate the con­cept of “reading as a woman,” that is to say, of recogniz­ing differences in reading and writing subjects, in language, and in cultural values (see, among others, Culler and Belsey). It is possible that the characterization of Doña Florentina was meant to give readers, male and female, a jolt. Here is a woman who infiltrates enemy territory, who carries out her sexual fantasies regardless of the price of her triumphs, and who puts the here and now before divine justice. Florentina’s life is spared, first, and in a brilliantly ironic stroke, when Don Dionisio’s sword hits the whalebone in her corset (the symbol par excellence of female confinement), and, later, when offi­cials decide not to prosecute her. She gets away with murder through good fortune, through influence, and through collusion. She practices violence indirectly, self-protectively. She turns the tables on patriarchy, but to what end?

    Florentina’s emulation of the masculinist paradigm brings amorality into women’s space, but only, Zayas would seem to argue, to flaunt its inappropriateness, its abnormality. The ending of Estragos que causa el vicio and the ending of the frame story function dialectically rather than analogously. Zayas’s allegories are complex, nuanced, and, in the last analysis, open. The author seems to be aware of the feminist impasse, of the need simulta­neously to work within and against the patriarchal system, within and against history. One defense against the wall of tradition is irony (see Williamsen). A second is inver­sion, or role-reversal, which generates new ironies and new difficulties. Still another is moralization. Zayas and her female narrators are unapologetic in their use of fic­tion for ethical ends. The abundance of commentary in the narratives demonstrates the writer’s attempt to hold a mir­ror to mankind, as it were (on the ethical dimension of feminism, see, e.g., Donovan). By filling the aesthetic space with brutality and exploitation, Zayas disquiets her readers, most likely in different ways. The judgments place the violence within a moral perspective and thereby create a peculiarly feminine space, in which the male nar­rators are reduced to narratees and finally written out of the picture. The merging of Lisis and Zayas in the closing pages of the Desengaños is reminiscent of the concluding passages of Don Quijote, in which (the translated and ed­ited) Arab historian Cide Hamete Benengeli and Miguel de Cervantes, united by a pen, address their readership. Zayas’s target audience, despite rhetorical flourishes to the contrary, is as much male as female, for the texts are geared to educate men while they reinforce what women already know. Estragos que causa el vicio may exemplify
the fem-inist impasse, but that is acceptable because the medium is very much the message and because Zayas is a paragon of overdetermination.

 

Works Cited

Belsey, Catherine. “A Future for Materialist Feminist Criticism?” The Matter of Difference: Materialist Feminist Criticism of Shakespeare. Ed. Valerie Wayne. Ithaca: Cornell UP, 1991. 257–70.

Culler, Jonathan. “Reading as a Woman.” On Decon­struction. Ithaca: Cornell UP, 1982. 43–64.

Donovan, Josephine. “Beyond the Net: Feminist Criticism as a Moral Criticism.” Denver Quarterly 17 (1983): 40–57.

Showalter, Elaine. “Feminist Criticism in the Wilder­ness.” Critical Inquiry 8 (1981): 179–206.

Williamsen, Amy R. “Engendering Interpretation: Irony as Comic Challenge in María de Zayas.” Romance Languages Annual 1991. Vol. 3. Ed. Jeanette Beer, Charles Ganelin, and Anthony Julian Tamburri. West Lafayette, IN: Purdue Research Foundation, 1992. 642–48.

Zayas, María de. Desengaños amorosos. Ed. Alicia Yllera. Madrid: Cátedra, 1983.