Script Analysis of the Loa to The Divine Narcissus
The Divine Narcissus is an auto sacramental, a type of religious play native to Spain, written by Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz; the play reframes the Greek mythological story of Narcissus and Echo to be a Christian one, where Narcissus takes on the role of Jesus and Christ and Echo the role of Satan (Kellman, eNotes). Its loa, a type of short performance that often preceded longer plays, does not share any part of The Divine Narcissus’s plot or premise. Rather, it concerns the dynamics between the early imperial Spain and the Aztec Empire they went on to conquer in the 16th century, as represented by the allegorical characters Occident, America, Music, Religion, and Zeal. The loa has five scenes in one act, and the action takes place over a period of time no longer than the performance would last, so it would fit into the Neoclassical ideal of Unity of Time. It has only one plotline, so it also follows the ideal of Unity of Action. The setting, like the characters, is allegorical--in fact, the characters Occident and America act both as characters and place, as "occident" refers to the West, and "America" specifically the Americas.
The Plot
Occident and America, acting as leaders of the Aztec Empire, are celebrating the Festival for Huitzilopochtli, referred to in the loa as the God of Seeds; for context, one of the activities of this festival is to sacrifice a person, mix their blood with seeds and grains, use that mixture to form an idol of the God of Seeds, and then eat that idol. Meanwhile, Religion and Zeal and their soldiers prepare to convert the Aztec Empire over to Christianity through any means necessary, hence the soldiers. They come in and interrupt Occident and America’s festival and confront them over their idolatrous worship. After sending bombs and gunfire to the Aztec land in the face of their refusal to convert, Zeal goes to kill America, but Religion objects. As the gunfire continues, Religion takes to explaining the Christian religion to Occident and America (who she seemingly refers to as “blind idolatry” on occasion) and its core tenets, and she gradually (but very quickly) wins them over. At the end of the play, she states that after Occident and America have been baptized, Religion will write a play, specifically the following play, The Divine Narcissus, to be performed all around the world so that other “Gentile people” may hear the good word of Christ, as well, and convert to Christianity.
The Big Ideas
The first main idea that Sor Juana explicitly puts forth in this loa is the juxtaposition of violence and conquest to peace and conversation, as represented by the differences the characters Religion and Zeal take in their approach to converting the “idolatrous” Aztecs. Whereas Zeal will take any opportunity to “punish” and “chastise” non-believers when faced with even the smallest amount of resistance to Religion’s gentler approach, Religion believes such violence to be completely unnecessary, and will steadfastly continue her approach until she has convinced the non-believers.
The second main idea is the comparisons between the Aztec Empire and the Spanish Empire’s violence. Just as the human sacrificial elements of the Aztecs are condemned as primitive, idolatrous and barbaric, the Spanish Zeal’s aggression towards dissenters is portrayed as overzealous (heh) and ultimately unnecessary. In this sense, Sor Juana seems to criticize the Spanish empire’s violent conquests as being no less barbaric than human sacrifice.
The Littler Ideas
Reading this loa through a North American 21st century lens, there is clear subtext regarding the less openly admitted motivations for Spain’s conquest of the Americas, which the themes of religious conversion in this play seem to be a metaphor for. This is first hinted at by the character America in her and Occident’s opening ceremony for the festival, wherein she mentions her gold-rich mines, and the reluctance to extract too much from them in the fear that the “miasma” from the mines may render their fertile croplands infertile and barren; the specific quote is, “knowing that this is true, that [the God of Seed’s] benevolence watches over us, his children, why would we care that our mines, a bounty of gold, make rich America richer, if the miasma from those mines turns fields barren, the fertile land sown with seeds that once bloomed into fruit, made desolate, a wasteland?” With this, America deems it blasphemous and disrespectful to the God of Seeds to engage in anything that may render his blessing useless, as his boon “preserves the life that it makes possible,” even if those other ventures may provide different benefits.
With the rest of Occident and America’s pre-Christian beliefs being portrayed and discussed as primitive and naive, this inconsideration to this kind of material wealth on their part is also portrayed as primitive and naive. Furthermore, Occident proclaims the Christian God as “the true God of Seeds,” thus overriding Huitzilopochtli’s divine power, and with Religion having described the Christian God as being all-loving, with his only condition for his love being believing in him, and all-powerful, it is implied that Christians don’t necessarily need to do anything to ensure disaster won’t strike them; as long as they revere the Holy Trinity and behave accordingly, God will take care of them—so, if they wanted to mine that gold mine, they don’t need to worry about their “plants” or whatever dying, because God will ensure that doesn’t happen. Thus introduces a justification for the Spaniards’ known lust for Aztec gold, and a further incentive to the Aztecs to convert—the Spaniards are going to mine their gold, but as long as the Aztec believe in the correct deity, harm won’t befall them.
This then ties into the other subtextual idea that is colonialism and imperialism. While the use of the word “primitive” to describe Aztec beliefs and culture seems to be neutral, as even America uses it to describe their religious rituals in a way that is synonymous with “original” or “true,” the Aztecs are, nonetheless, portrayed as being much more primitive than the colonizing Spaniards, with the Aztecs only having arrows as defense against the Spanish soldiers’ guns and cannons.
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