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The Return of Astraea - An Astral-Imperial Myth in Calderon (Paperback)
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The Return of Astraea - An Astral-Imperial Myth in Calderon (Paperback)
Series: Studies in Romance Languages
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In classical mythology Astraea, the goddess of justice, chastity,
and truth, was the last of the immortals to leave Earth with the
decline of the ages. Her return was to signal the dawn of a new
Golden Age. This myth not only survived the Christian Middle Ages
but also became a commonplace in the Renaissance when courtly poets
praised their patrons and princes by claiming that Astraea guided
them. The literary cult of Astraea persisted in the sixteenth
century as writers saw in Elizabeth I of England the imperial
Astraea who would lead mankind to peace through universal rule.
This and other late flowerings of the Astraea myth should not be
taken as the final phases of her history. Frederick A. de Armas
documents in this book what may well be the last great rebirth of
Astraea, one that is probably of greater political, religious, and
literary significance than others previously described by
historians and literary critics. The Return of Astraea focuses on
the seventeenth-century Spanish playwright Pedro Calderon de la
Barca, and analyzes the deity's presence in thirteen of his plays,
including his masterpiece, La Vida es Sueho. Her popularity in this
period is partially attributed to political motives, reflecting the
aspirations and fears of the Spanish monarch Philip IV. In this
broad study, grounded on such diverse fields as astrology,
iconography, history, mythology, and philosophy, de Armas explains
that Astraea adopts many guises in Calderon's dramas. Ranging from
the Kabbalah to Platonic thought and from satires on Olivares to
cosmogonic myths, he analyzes and reinterprets Calderon's theater
from a wide range of perspectives centered on the playwright's
utilization of the myth of Astraea. The book thus represents a new
view of Calderon's dramaturgy and also documents the popularity and
significance of this astral-imperial myth during the Spanish Golden
Age.
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