HUM 2461
Humanities of Latin America
Spring 2013
Day 23
12th of November
 Attendance
 Renassaince and “lo barroco” in Sor
Juana Inés de la Cruz.
 POP QUIZ
Activity #1
1. Students have to take notes from this
presentation.
2. End of class student will take a quiz
for EXTRA CREDIT in the
MIDTERM exam.
Sor juan
inés de la cruz
Aztec Empire
Mesoamérica
México
lo barroco in mexico
A profusion of adornment in all the arts,
and
A complicated façades, abundant foliage,
plaster darts, crossings, coiling, scrolls, and
conical shapes mixed with traditional
shapes in sculpture and architecture.
characteristics of lo barroco in
literature
 Extreme decoration
 Subtle conceits (clever plays on words):
language is “slippery ground”
 Maximum culture (knowledge, all the
reading of humanities)
 Pessimism
 Metaphor
 Stark opposites (light/dark)
 Veras and burlas
METAPHOR
A figure of speech in which a word or phrase that
ordinarily designates one thing is used to designate
another, thus making an implicit comparison, as in
"a sea of troubles" or "All the world's a stage"
(Shakespeare).
Which is your?, get a piece of paper and write
down a metaphor!
Veras & burlas
Veras
&
burlas
THE CREST
THE COPLA
Sor juana inés de la cruz
(17th century)
Juana de Asbaje y
Ramírez
Sor Juana
México, nov. 12th, 1651April 17th, 1695
Writer and poet.
1651 - 1695 / San Miguel Nepantla /
Mexico
Two main
contributions
1. Against the role of church. Expressed in prose,
mainly.
1. Against patriarchal societies. Expressed in poetry.
Most important literary work
Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz was an exceptional XVII-century nun
who set precedents for feminism long before the term or
concept existed.
Her defense (letter) "Respuesta a Sor Filotea” (Reply to Sister
Philothea) is a maverick work outlining the logical sense of
women’s education more than 200 years before Virginia
Woolf ’s “A Room of One’s Own.”
Most important literary work
IN POETRY:
Her poetry, meanwhile, states in bold language
the potency of the feminine in both love and
religion.
Poems such as “You Men” and “First Dream”
pointed out how women were mistreated by
men and society.
1) Against the role of church:
“Respuesta a sor filotea”
What is “Respuesta a Sor Filotea”?
It is an answer to the Bishop of Puebla
(México), Fray Manuel Fernández de Santa
Cruz,
defending herself.
1) Against the role of church:
“Respuesta a sor filotea”
What is “Respuesta a Sor Filotea”?
Sor Juana critiques a famous sermon given
—40 years earlier—
by the eminent Portuguese Jesuit,
Antonio de Vieira (Baroque Brazil)
1) Against the role of church:
“Respuesta a sor filotea”
 Sor Juana writes —by his request—
“Carta atenagérica”
 Fray Manuel Fernández also includes a letter
of his own titled “Missive Worthy of Athena.”
(1691)
 In the letter he is admonishing Sor Juana for
her intellectualism under the pen name
Sor Philothea de la Cruz.
Fragments of
“respuesta a sor filotea”
1. The publication of my work is a blessing which
makes me feel unworthy.
2. I can’t thank you because I don’t know how, not
because I’m ungrateful. I want to benefit more from
your goodness; you can help to shape my intellect.
3. But your kindness does prompt me to answer, and I
understand your warning to be against my secular
writings. But how should I write of sacred things if
I might misunderstand them? I don’t study to write
or teach but to be less ignorant.
Fragments of
“respuesta a sor filotea”
4. How much harm would be avoided in our country if
older women were as learned as Laeta and knew how
to teach in the way Saint Paul and my Father Saint
Jerome direct!
5. Instead of which, if fathers wish to educate their
daughters beyond what is customary, for want of
trained older women and on account of the extreme
negligence which has become women's sad lot, since
well-educated older women are unavailable, they are
obliged to bring in men teachers to give instruction…
Fragments of
“respuesta a sor filotea”
6. As a result of this, many fathers prefer leaving
their daughters in a barbaric, uncultivated state to
exposing them to an evident danger such a
familiarity with men breeds.
Some points
1. Laeta’s knowledge  Be able to learn (women
can have knowledge as Laeta).
2. Saint Paul and Father Saint Jerome be able
to teach (women can teach women).
3. Uneducated women Ignorance is dangerous.
4. Women become an easy prey  Opens
discussion over rape.
Last lines of “respuesta…”
57.And if you say I shouldn’t write poetry because I
am a woman, you are saying the evil is in my
being a woman – because there is no evil in
poetry. Besides, I’ve only written when begged to
by others. Even the piece you respond to [the
prose critique] was not written by my own
volition and I did not intend someone like you to
ever read it.
Last lines of “respuesta…”
57.It has been criticized, but I deem it better not to
defend it, because the truth will speak for itself.
Praise is more harmful than criticism, anyway, as
it tempts one to pride.
58.I will ask your correction of any further writing I
do.
59.I hope I have not been too familiar.
60.I request God’s blessings on you.
Conclusions for “RESPUESTA…”
Sor Juana turned around the logic used
by the Church to justify her oppression
and subverted it into a magnificent
defense for women's intellectual rights and
education.
Conclusions for “RESPUESTA…”
Though the letter’s tone is superficially
humble, Sor Juana forcefully insists that
women have a natural right to the mind.
Her use of biblical evidence to support her
call for strong, educated women is
downright clever -- and has earned her
recognition for her rhetorical skills.
Conclusions for “RESPUESTA…”
 “Respuesta a Sor Filotea” brought
indignation from the Church and
unwanted attention from the Inquisition.
 To save herself, Sor Juana was forced to
stop writing and to give up her books.
Characteristics of baroque
On her writing (?)
On her life (?)
On her attitude (?)
2) Against patriarchal societies.
through POETRY: “YOU men”
Hombres necios que acusáis
a la mujer sin razón,
sin ver que sois la ocasión
de lo mismo que culpáis:
si con ansia sin igual
solicitáis su desdén,
¿por qué quereis que obren bien
si las incitáis al mal?
Combatís su resistencia
y luego, con gravedad,
decís que fue liviandad
lo que hizo la diligencia.
Silly, you men-so very adept
at wrongly faulting womankind,
not seeing you're alone to blame
for faults you plant in woman's mind.
After you've won by urgent plea
the right to tarnish her good name,
you still expect her to behave—
you, that coaxed her into shame.
You batter her resistance down
and then, all righteousness, proclaim
that feminine frivolity,
not your persistence, is to blame.
“YOU men”
Pues ¿para qué os espantáis
de la culpa que tenéis?
Queredlas cual las hacéis
o hacedlas cual las buscáis.
Dejad de solicitar,
y después, con más razón,
acusaréis la afición
de la que os fuere a rogar.
Bien con muchas armas fundo
que lidia vuestra arrogancia,
pues en promesa e instancia
juntáis diablo, carne y mundo.
So why are you men all so stunned
at the thought you're all guilty alike?
Either like them for what you've made
them
or make of them what you can like.
If you'd give up pursuing them,
you'd discover, without a doubt,
you've a stronger case to make
against those who seek you out.
I well know what powerful arms
you wield in pressing for evil:
your arrogance is allied
with the world, the flesh, and the devil!
Dream vision
DREAM ALLEGORY
 Emerged as a poetic genre in the Middle Ages.
 Kind of narrative.
 Narrator falls asleep and dreams the events of the tale.
 The story is often a kind of allegory  a tour of some
marvelous realm.
 Dante Alighieri The Divine Comedy (c. 1320)
 The dream vision was much favored by medieval poets,
most of them influenced by the 13th‐century Roman de la
rose by the French poets Guillaume de Lorris and Jean de
Meung.
First Dream, 1692
Primero sueño
 Her most celebrated work.
 Silva (a poetic form combining verses of 7 and 11 syllables)
 Describes through the form of a dream the soul's rising toward
knowledge, employing extensively Sor Juana's knowledge of the
sciences.
 The poem is baroque style, yet seems to foreshadow the Enlightenment
in its scientifically oriented worldview.
 Interpretations of ”Primero sueño” are diverse. It has been variously
described as metaphysical, as a defense of the private viewpoint, and as a
work that in outlook foreshadows modern Mexican nihilism.
 Regardless of interpretation, it is perhaps her most important piece,
particularly because of her claim that it was the only work she
composed on her own impulse rather than at the request of another.
Spanish poets leading topics
similar to hers: death
• Jorge Manrique (1440-1479)
• “Coplas por la muerte de su padre”/ “Stanzas on his
father’s death”
Recuerde el alma dormida, avive el seso y despierte
contemplando
cómo se pasa la vida, cómo se viene la muerte tan
callando,
cuán presto se va el placer, cómo, después de acordado,
da dolor;
cómo, a nuestro parecer, cualquiera tiempo pasado fue
mejor.
Spanish poets leading topics
similar to hers: death
• “Stanzas on his father’s death”
Let from its dream the soul awaken,
And reason mark with open eyes
The scene unfolding,—
How lightly life away is taken,
How cometh Death in stealthy guise,—
At last beholding;
What swiftness hath the flight of pleasure
That, once attained, seems nothing more
Than respite cold;
How fain is memory to measure
Each latter day inferior
To those of old.
Spanish poets leading topics
similar to hers: dream
• *Luis de Góngora y Argote (1561-1627)
• “A un sueño”/”A dream”
El sueño (autor de representaciones),
En su teatro, sobre el viento armado,
Sombras suele vestir de bulto bello.
Síguele; mostrárate el rostro amado,
Y engañarán un rato tus pasiones
Dos bienes, que serán dormir y vello.
Spanish poets leading topics
similar to hers: dream
• “A un sueño”/”A dream”
The Dream (author of representations),
In the theater, on the wind armed
Shadows usually wear beautiful package.
Follow him; mostraráte the beloved face,
And deceive a while your passions
Two goods, you will sleep and hair.
Spanish poets leading topics
similar to hers: dream
• *Pedro Calderón de la Barca (1600-81)
• “La vida es sueño” (Life is a Dream)
¿Qué es la vida? Un frenesí.
¿Qué es la vida? Una ilusión,
una sombra, una ficción,
y el mayor bien es pequeño;
que toda la vida es sueño,
y los sueños, sueños son.
Spanish poets leading topics
similar to hers: dream
• “Life is a Dream”
What is life? A madness.
What is life? An illusion,
a shadow, a story.
And the greatest good is little enough;
for all life is a dream,
and dreams themselves are only dreams.
What do you think el
inca garcilaso and
sor juana have in
common?
Illustrated foreigners.
Belong to the Renaissance period, but live under a
ruled society (Spain in México).
Educated writers.
No position in the patriarchal world.
Pop quiz
1. What is “lo barroco” in México?
2. Who is the maximum exponent in
literature?
3. What does she represent?
4. What did she write?
5. Which work of hers caused her exile in
literature?