Lorcas El Maleficio De La Mariposa :: Lorca Maleficio Mariposa Essays

Lorcas El Maleficio De La MariposaFederico Garcia Lorca was a Spanish poet who explored universal themesof mania, lust, death and violence under the semblance of whimsicaltragedies. The self-proclaimed gay had fanciful reveries declaring his just about child-like take on the chaotic conditions of his time. Althoughdisguised as nothing more than a dark world-beater tale, Lorcas El MaleficioDe La Mariposa, like all his deliver the goods plays, is replete withsymbolism that is quite impossible to grasp for minds clouded everywhere byyears of the worlds sensibilities.UPs Filipino translation of Lorcas earliest work was entitled AngMalupit na Encanto ng Mariposa. I found it puzzling that the actorsdelivered English lines when the ticket said that the play was aFilipino rendition. Besides, the title was in Filipino. My puzzlementis not over the fact that it was translated at all. The original,after all, would have been impossible for us to comprehend since itwas in Spanish. But why not in Filipino? Either way, it wastranslated. Therefore, slightly of the scathingly disturbing images ofLorcas dialogs may have been lost.However, I do not think the play was in such a serious t whizz -sad, yes, only not too high-brow and tight-lipped. It is amazing to think of howa man like Lorca, who troubles himself with the endeavors andtragedies of bugs and insects can be considered one of the greatestpoets of the 21st century. The play had the makings of a fairy tale-what with animals thinking and contriving, a beetle obsessing overlove, and a beautiful butterfly collapsing into their care. It wasenough to make the little girl in me swoon with memories of childishnessdreams, and hope that the beetle, with his troubadourian serenades,and the butterfly end up together. To add to this effect, theproduction was very pretty. Seeing the play through the artistry ofDulaang UP was a visual delight. The discreetness lights overhead theaudience brought us into the enchantment of the bee tles over finding abutterfly in their midst. The choreography, too, moved the fantasticmood along. I didnt know one could create a whole routine out ofbeetles and scorpions scamperings.But amid the loveliness of the set and choreography, I found a terrorin a disaster that was still beautifully distressing. Here came out thepain of a longing frustrated by conventions in the young boy beetlespining for a love he cannot have. Here is the brilliance of Lorcaspoetry, the way he combines fear (in the scorpions menacing advances)and pain (in the love that cannot be reciprocated) with beauty. Thatwas where my confusion comes in, where I appealed to symbolism to make