On Preaching in Three Plays by Cervantes: El trato de Argel, Los baños de Argel and El rufián dichoso

Abstract

The creative genius of Cervantes was not immune to the influence that preachers wielded in Spain of the Counter-reformation. In this context, the oratorical genre is the one that exercised the greatest social influence, surpassing even the impact of popular theater, to the extent that it was a powerful contributor to the molding of ideas in the society of that time. This study analyzes the characteristic elements of what we might denominate, at certain moments of a number of the plays of Cervantes, a ‘sermon play’, along with the inherently indoctrinating function that is associated with this type of work. In some passages of El trato de Argel, El Rufián dichoso and Los baños de Argel we will also be able to observe the configuration of the discourse in a way that a rhetorician of sacred oratory, such as the Jesuit Juan Bautista Escardó ([1581]-1652), defined as a ‘tono’ or brief sermon in his Retórica cristiana (1647), a widespread practice among students of the Society of Jesus. This study also examines other themes and motifs inspired by sermons that Cervantes may have utilized in order to write certain fragments of his dramatic works, driven by the defense of Catholic doctrine that was consecrated by the Council of Trent.