Alexandra Bramsen
Professor Santana and Professor Edmondson
Theater 16
15 March 2021
Research Paper: Estrella in Life is a Dream
The character of Estrella, a Polish princess, in Calderón’s Life is a Dream and how she is involved in state affairs and her own marital engagements fits well into the understanding of women in royalty of early 17th century Poland where the play is set and especially Spain where the play was written and performed. Calderón drew on historical monarchies of Poland and Spain for inspiration in writing Life is a Dream, so looking at Estrella it is fair to compare her to the queens of that time. While she is suited to real-life examples of queenship in early modern Poland and Spain, the queens that most resemble her character and conduct are those that stepped beyond the gender norms of the time and established strong queenships. This is shown where she has direct involvement in the ordeal of succession and most poignant when she joins the fight during the civil war at the end with no one doing anything to stop her. Her portrayed power is best matched with the outliers of queenship that did not fit the expected passive and domestic role, like that of Poland’s Bona Sforza and Spain’s Isabella of Castille. Her relevant power as a female royal is best understood when looking at her involvement in the affairs of the state, her control over marriage, how she is personified and what her reputation is and compare it all to what was known about and expected of female royalty in Poland and Spain in the Early Modern Era.
G. A. Davies in his article Poland, Politics, and “La Vida es Sueño” explores how Calderón utilizes existing contexts of Poland’s political climate during the late 16th and early 17th century to draw inspiration for his 1629 play Life is a Dream (147). Poland, while geographically distant from Spain had the attention of the Spanish court which gave Calderón an avenue of insight into its affairs. This interest was in part due to the renewal of Spanish-Dutch tensions and the need of Poland as an ally, then secondly a result of Poland’s increasingly affluent intellectual humanist society, and finally because of invested interests in religious and political grappling’s within the state (Davies 147-150). The Holy Roman Empire was interested in seeing Catholicism prevail particularly concerning Jesuit activity and the takeover of Ottoman lands, winning over the Eastern Church (Davies 147). Poland’s elective monarchy meant that ascension of power was often unpredictable and chaotic, which was a theme maintained in Life is a Dream, although Calderón adapted the problems of succession to fit with the hereditary monarchy that Spain was familiar with (Davies 154-155). It also appears that he set the play in a fictional version of Poland during the aftermath of Stephen Bathory’s Russian conquest of 1605-1609 to validate the Polish-Russian connections portrayed, especially those of Astolfo, Clotaldo and Rosaura. Other characters draw on existing figures in that history, as Clotaldo is believed to ressemble the notorious privado John Zamojski an advisor to both King Sigismund Augustus and the previously mentioned King Stephen Bathory (Davies 155). While Calderón gave his play deeper verisimilitude with his use of true Polish political contexts, it is important to note that Life is a Dream was significantly influenced by Enrique Suárez de Mendoza y Figueroa’s contemporary fictional story Historia muscovica similarly set in Eastern Europe dealing with monarchical instability, expected morality of princes, god’s omnipotence, and concerns of destiny (Davies 150). Calderón later altered his play to focus more on the theme of the dream qualities of life over that of the question of succession despite its relevance to the issue of Phillip IV of Spain, who fell ill in 1629, lacking a male heir (Davies 156). Life is a Dream drew on existing political topics, people, and literature in Poland and Spain, but ultimately was Calderón’s unique creation.
Female power during the Early Modern Era relied heavily on their relations with their male kin. Looking at the queenship of Bona Sforza of Poland 1518-1557 using Charles Beem’s summary of her rule in Queenship in Early Modern Europe we can see some parallels to Estrella, the Polish princess, in Life is a Dream (160). Bona Sforza relied on her amicable relationship with her husband the King Sigismund the Old as he enabled her ambitious moves to consolidate power by accruing wealth and property which was unlike the general domestic ideas of a typical queen’s role. She could be the obedient wife of the king while using that to leverage her actions as the ruthless ruler who often antagonized the nobility (Beem 160-161). However, her rocky relationship with her son Sigismund II Augustus led to the decline of her power in Poland (Beem 162). Similarly, Queen Isabella of Castille very uniquely held onto power by utilizing a strong image of the unity between her and her husband Ferdinand, that formed a “companionate monarchy” (Lehfeldt 37). Isabella further protected her power by projecting her role as a queen that pursued pious and domestic goals that fit the gendered understandings of the time, even though she was quintessentially the acting kingship of Castille (Beem 13-18). She even staged her own acclamation to the throne without Ferdinand and conducted the processions led by a typically male symbol of an unsheathed sword. This rush to assert her sovereignty without her husband by her side was because circumstances had them apart when her half-brother King Henry IV and she needed to beat Henry’s daughter Juana to it, as she also had a claim to the throne (Lehfeldt 38-39). This controversial action was mostly made up for later by the strong and agreeable image of the loving couple of Isabella and Ferdinand that satisfied qualms over how they conform to their gendered roles (Beem 14). The need for congenial male kin connections to enable female power is reflected in Calderón’s Estrella as she is engaged in a forced marriage to Astolfo to consolidate her claim to the throne and abate the potential violence that would ensue should they choose to maintain their rivalry. Estrella was not afraid to challenge Astolfo when they first met or when she questioned his faithfulness to their agreed engagement, and her contributions to the final battle were distinctly of her own initiative. Then again, it is possible to argue that Basilio as her uncle and Astolfo as her fiancé allowed for her to take these liberties with her position as princess.
Bona Sforza had significant political engagement as the Queen, both internally and externally, which could be used to understand Estrella’s direct engagement in state affairs of Poland in Life is a Dream. Isabella of Castille also held very significant political power, which can help understand where Spanish audiences might make connections with the presentation of Estrella’s political power. Notably, Estrella is involved in figuring out Segismundo’s claim to the throne and she chooses to fight in the civil war against the uprising rebellion for Segismundo’s succession. While she is a significantly smaller character in the context of the story, she shows up at these key points of the plot. King Basilio even notes that he wishes to treat her and Astolfo equally (Calderón 13). Bona Sforza did not fight any wars, but she utilized her Italian roots and connections to other European queens to make significant contributions to Polish foreign policy and dealings, while internally she was responsible for bringing the Renaissance to Poland (Beem 161). Isabella and Ferdinand exercised unified power, but in many ways, it has been inferred that Isabella as the heir to Castille the larger state held a large portion of that control, but both had to play a role to fit the ideas of the male kingship and domesticized queenship. Isabella considered her greatest accomplishment to be the conquest of Granada, which then combined with her role as a chivalrous Queen and a quasi “Catholic king” involved in the crusader kingdom of the time, lends to the audience being able to accept seeing Estrella involved in the civil war and choosing to go off to battle in Life is a Dream (Beem 13-18). Both these female royals played crucial parts in the workings of their country’s politics, despite the limitations of displayed female power based on early modern gender dynamics.
Estrella also affirms the trends of royalty marrying for the state, as was seen often in Europe, except for Sigismund II, Bona’s son who struggled with this and married for love (Beem 165). Isabella of Castille is also a bit of an exception to the trends in royal marriage as she went against her male guardian’s wishes, her brother Enrique IV, and chose to marry her cousin Ferdinand of Aragon all on her own accord. Their marriage still had the expected state benefits though as it brought together Castille and Aragon that eventually led to the unification of Spain (Beem 14). Estrella initially agreed to marry Astolfo for the sake of state stability, while she also had her own legitimate claim to the throne. Then after the war she is told by Segismundo that he will marry her because Rosaura must marry Astolfo to regain her honor. Estrella does seem pleased with the new arrangement at the end exclaiming, “I seem to have got myself a better husband,” but it would go against Calderón’s typical happy conclusion to have any other response from her that might give a clearer indication on her position (100). So, it is safe to infer that the final marriage arrangement of Princess Estrella and her cousin Prince Segismundo still agrees with the expectation of royalty marrying for political reasons over love and keeping marital relations in the upper class which often meant the intermarrying of families.
Often a queen’s reputation was strongly based on their perceived decorum, piety and conformation to the popular idea of gender roles. It is clear throughout the play based on both Basilio, but mostly Atolfo’s comments on Estrella that she is considered a fine lady and he “greatly esteem(s) her” (Calderón 57). This likely means she fits the bill of a pious domesticated princess, a reputation Bona was not so concerned with, but one that was of great importance to Isabella of Castille. Bona was considered pious and charitable for her works of servitude to her people. Nonetheless, as she outwardly defied the ideas of a domesticated queen, was considered to be rather brash in her approach, and ticked off nobility with her consolidation of power and wealth there were often rumors that she participated in witchcraft and worst of all poisoned her own daughter-in-law. In fact, the roots of disagreement between Bona and her son stem from Bona not being able to support his match afore mentioned daughter-in-law and also presumably prompted such rumors (Beem 162). Isabella on the other hand was very concerned with her portrayals, as she would dress lavishly for court entertainment and encourage courtly love conversation whilst purposefully choosing to be conservatively dressed and humbly positioned in her portraits. Furthermore, she worked to maintain a chaste image that fit the queenship refusing to dance with other men at court without her husband present (Beem 17-18). Representation of royalty in Life is a Dream was made to fit with the conventions of rulers as pious, prudent, and restrained, reputations that were sought after most with the Habsburgs who maintained an important connection between monarchy and religion (Garcia-Bryce). In terms of Estrella’s jealousy over Astolfo’s portrait of Rosaura it is possible to argue that this went against the expected restrained nature of a monarch, but still agrees with religious concerns of reputation. As a “good Christian ruler,” it is fair that Estrella would want to have the complete devotion of her future husband, as would be expected of her in return. Her concern is further validated as the strength of their mutual devotion would be the source of stability for her power, based on understandings of how other queens like Bona and Isabella used their marriage to secure power.
Paul Allatson in his article Confounding Convention: ‘Women’ in Three Golden Age Plays investigates how Life is a Dream and two other Golden Age canonical works complicate the typical representation of gendered power. Allatson’s focus in analyzing Calderón’s Life is a Dream is how Rosaura disrupts the traditional conventions of male domination and female subjugation by her intentional adoption of fictive and transgendered roles for which the end of the play does not account for. Her characterization of male personifications and simultaneous eroticization and vindication as a woman is inconsolable to the audience, especially when she achieves her goal at the end of marrying Astolfo and redeeming her honor (Allatson 268-271). This is an honor that is not often afforded women, especially women that adopt male dress that could then be taken as “masterless woman” since it would go against the pursuit of the religious poetic justice in the play to have such women succeed (Allatson 270). In this context of the play where the usual social constructions of gender representation are distorted, its clear that the female representation in Life is a Dream could be considered to go beyond the ontological (Allatson 268-270). So, while there are aspects to Estrella that fit the ontological preconceptions, like Rosaura, she also complicates them, particularly in her self-motivation and proclamation as a warrior during the civil war. It is likely that her directness in conversations with Astolfo over succession and her doubts of his intentions with the engagement at the beginning also fit this understanding of a confused ontology of gender in Life is a Dream. Calderón’s female characters in Life is a Dream display a womanhood that was not tamed by the end of the play, which was likely an unsettling conclusion for audiences of that period (Allatson 270).
The character of Princess Estrella in Calderón’ Life is a Dream is seen to reflect the powers of historical queenships of the time, particularly that of the Polish Queen Bona Sforza and Queen Isabella of Castille, while also fitting the ontological distortions of gender that are shown in the play. The 17th century Spanish audience’s knowledge of these two queens and that of Calderón’s would allow for there to be a context to draw on when considering Estrella’s displayed political powers. It is shown from Estrella’s position in conversations that she has an active role in state affairs of Poland in Life is a Dream, as did Bona and Isabella in their respective kingdoms. This political power afforded to her, like Bona and Isabella, was mainly derived from the liberty she was given by her relationships to ruling males, her uncle, King Basilio, fiancé Astolfo, and her fiancé at the end, Prince Segismundo. In order to increase the stability of this vicarious authority, she bows to marriages arranged for the sake of the state, as did the majority of European royals of the time. She also appears to be concerned with maintaining an admirable reputation as was Isabella of Castille, because having the approval of the court and the people allowed her to secure her position of influence as a monarch. Relatively Estrella was given more freedom than might be considered appropriate to transcend gender boundaries of power, as shown with her participation in the war, presumably because of the high regard her male kin had for her. However, this transgression of gender roles by Estrella also could be attributed to Calderón’s own choice to confuse gendered social norms in Life is a Dream which is most obvious with the conduct of Rosaura’s character.
Works Cited
Allatson, Paul. “Confounding Convention: ‘Women’ in Three Golden Age Plays.” Bulletin of the Comediantes, vol. 48, no. 2, Comediantes, 1996, pp. 261–73, doi:10.1353/boc.1996.0015.
Beem, Charles. Queenship in Early Modern Europe. London: Red Globe Press, 2020. Print.
Calderón Pedro. Life Is a Dream. Translated by John Clifford, Nick Hern Books, 2007.
Davies, G. A. “Poland, Politics, and “La Vida es Sueño”.”Bulletin of Hispanic Studies (Liverpool), vol. 70, no. 1, 1993, pp. 147. ProQuest, https://search.proquest.com/scholarly-journals/poland-politics-la-vida-es-sueño/docview/1310535901/se-2?accountid=10422.
García-Bryce, Ariadna. “The Prince and the Pauper: Embodying Royalty in Calderonian Drama.” Bulletin of Hispanic Studies, vol. 88, no. 5, 2011, pp. 499-520. ProQuest, https://search.proquest.com/scholarly-journals/prince-pauper-embodying-royalty-calderonian-drama/docview/875538096/se-2?accountid=10422.
Lehfeldt, Elizabeth A. “The Gender of Shared Sovereignty: Texts and the Royal Marriage of Isabella and Ferdinand.” Women, Texts and Authority in the Early Modern Spanish World, 2003, pp. 37–55., doi:10.4324/9781315233550-3.