The Answer / La Respuesta by Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz

Brief attention is given her courtly and love poems while the villancicos (Christmas carols), often skillfully and wittily presenting the humbler elements of Mexican society, are dismissed as “not poetry.” Numerous pages are devoted to the generally accepted belief that Sor Juana was not a mystic, and then the author condescendingly states, with respect to her rationalism, that she “unquestionably had a childlike ( sic) zeal when it came to knowledge.” This often clumsily worded presentation of the famous poetess of colonial Mexico and her work seems unlikely to attract the wider audience of “intelligent laymen” that she deserves and to which the Twayne series of World Authors apparently addresses itself. Who gave the sermon that the Repuesta critiques Antonio de Vieira.

Real name of Sor Filotea de la Cruz Bishop of Puebla (Manuel Fernandez de Santa Cruz) Four main precepts of her Order humility, charity, prayer, penitence. His longest chapters deal with Sor Juana’s dramatic writings, secular comedies and religious allegories. What type of order did Sor Juana belong to Hieronymite. He scorns the “kaleidoscopic slew ( sic) of opinions” of critics intrigued by the intellectual preoccupations of this cloistered nun, and he blames them for what he curiously terms “the Black Legend of Sor Juana.” Though she is best known for her lyric poetry, the author states: “I have passed over many of her verses, for example, the romances which I consider wooden.” This adjective is ill-chosen, particularly if applied to the ballad (which he fails to mention) Finjamos que soy feliz (Let us pretend for a moment that I am happy and fortunate) its haunting lines of deep feeling suggest some of the inner conflicts that tormented this gifted woman.Īfter a succinct biographical sketch, the author offers his theories concerning the structure and meaning of her enigmatic poem Primero Sueño, more widely respected than read owing to its obscurity. The author of this slim book seems an exception, however, for he largely limits himself to a philological analysis of her writings. Pausing after an animated discourse on the nun-poetess, the Mexican critic sighed: “Ah, yo estoy enamorado de ella!” thus expressing the feeling of many devotees of the work, life, and fascinating personality of this complex and anguished woman of seventeenth-century Mexico. Many years ago in Mexico City this reviewer was conversing with the distinguished sorjuanista, E.

The Answer / La Respuesta by Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz