Don Alvaro, or the Force of Fate was the benchmark Romantic play of early nineteenth-century Spain. This English translation is designed for either classroom use or performance. The play tells of the torrid love of the mysterious Don Alvaro and the lovely Dona Leonor, and how fate intervenes.
Don Alvaro, or the Force of Fate by Angel de Saavedra, Duke of Rivas (1791-1865), premiered in 1835 in Madrid and changed the Spanish stage forever after. It was the benchmark Romantic play of early nineteenth-century Spain. In this English edition designed for either classroom use or performance, Robert Fedorchek presents a readable translation faithful to the tone and spirit of the original. Joyce Tolliver enhances the book with a rich introduction highlighting the work's lasting significance.
The play tells of the torrid love of the mysterious Don Alvaro and the lovely Doqa Leonor, and how fate intervenes, by way of Alvaro's role in the accidental death of Leonor's father, to bring about the extermination of Leonor's family at the hands of the man who loves her to distraction.
Although chronologically not the first Spanish Romantic drama, Don Alvaro is generally considered the true exponent of the freedom of expression that Romanticism brought to the theater. It does away with all the Neoclassical rules: it exceeds twenty-four hours; the action takes place in two countries; it mixes high and low; prose alternates with verse; and the characters express, melodramatically and passionately, their innermost feelings. It is also generally considered the first play in the best trilogy, along with Antonio Garcma Gutiirrez's El trovador (The troubadour, 1836) and Juan Eugenio Hartzenbusch's Los amantes de Teruel (The lovers of Teruel, 1837).
Robert M. Fedorchek is Professor of Spanish at Fairfield University. He has translated into English numerous works, among them Stories of Enchantment from Nineteenth-Century Spain, Juan Valera's Doqa Luz, and Concha Castroviejo's The Gardenwith Seven Gates. Joyce Tolliver is Associate Professor of Spanish and Women's Studies at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and has published widely on nineteenth-century Spanish literature.
