House of Trials

After reading House of Trials many things stood out to me that could be looked at as conventions of Spanish Golden Age comedia’s. For example the character’s asides, the poetic verse, long monologues, characters driven by honor and knowledge that the characters are in a play. Not reading any other Spanish Golden Age plays I would assume that these are convention that these plays would have in common. Though these are all important, I will go into further detail of the two I believe are more cructial. 

One convention would be the characters’ asides to the audience. This concept is different than the well-made plays we have read in class. In The Glass of Water, for example, the characters stay within the world of the play and only speak to each other.  However in House of Trials, the characters often break the fourth wall to tell the audience what they are thinking. The characters’ asides are done in order for the playwright is able to let the audience know the characters’ true thoughts since there is such deceit in this play. 

Another important convention of the comedia would be the poetic dialogue written in verse. In The Glass of Water, the characters speak in a normal way that dialogue would take place if it was being lived. However in The House of Trials, the characters speak in poetry. The words flow and are often wordy in order to fit the context of a verse. This heightened language creates a different feeling for the audience than natural speaking patterns, like Shakespearian verse does.