The Courage to Right a Woman's Wrongs
By Ana Caro
Directed by Melia Bensussen
One of the Spanish Golden Age’s most accomplished female playwrights, Ana Caro, presents a witty critique of society through the story of Leonor, a woman who sets out to find her one-time lover (Don Juan, naturally) and bring him to justice. The Courage to Right a Woman’s Wrongs is a comedy of wild intrigue and lively ingenuity in which Leonor crosses geographical boundaries and defies social expectations of gender in order to bring her fickle lover to justice and restore her lost honor.
Dressed as the dashing Leonardo, Leonor travels from Seville to Brussels, where she finds Juan and initiates her shrewd plan for revenge. What follows is a hilarious feat of masterful maneuvering, replete with cross-dressing and unexpected twists, in which she repeatedly outwits the men around her. And while the thrill of Leonor’s efforts to seek redress culminates with the expected restoration of her honor and marriage to Juan, the questions raised by her demands for justice make the play anything but conventional. Through this stirring tale of a woman’s courage to right the wrongs she has suffered, the play holds up to scrutiny contemporary notions of masculine honor and offers in their place a vision that opens up space for women and their agency.
Una de las dramaturgas más famosas del Siglo de Oro, Ana Caro, presenta una mordaz crítica de su sociedad a través de la historia de Leonor, una mujer dispuesta a obligar a Don Juan, el traidor amante que la ha abandonado, a proceder como es justo. Valor, agravio y mujer (presentada aquí en traducción al inglés) es una comedia llena de intrigas e ingenio, con una protagonista que cruza fronteras y trasgrede contra las expectativas de su sexo para conseguir lo que busca.