Sederi Yearbook 34

Jennifer Ruiz-Morgan, “An unconventional adaptation: Ángel María Dacarrete’s Julieta y Romeo (1858).” SEDERI 34 (2024): 79–98.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.34136/sederi.2024.4                                                         Download PDF

Abstract

This article examines Julieta y Romeo (1858), an unconventional adaptation of Romeo and Juliet written by Ángel María Dacarrete. The play has received no scholarly attention since Alfonso Par’s pioneering works on Shakespeare in Spain (published in 1936 and 1940), and it deserves to be re-evaluated. It focuses on the innovations introduced by Dacarrete, the performance history, and the ensuing rejection by most contemporary critics owing to a supposed lack of originality and equally supposed appalling immorality. It argues that, at a time in which Shakespeare was largely unknown, adaptation was beneficial rather than detrimental to the reception of Shakespeare in Spain.

Keywords: Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet, Spain, adaptation, appropriation.

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