'El Retrato de la Lozana andaluza': A Portrait of Transgression.

摘要

In this dissertation, I argue that Francisco Delicado's El Retrato de la Lozana andaluza (1528) is a satire that ridicules and denounces blood purity and the codes of conduct of the elite in early modern Spain and Italy. This approach departs from the traditional or didactic view of the work as a mimetic representation of society, which mainly functions as a condemnation of the corruption exhibited in the Rome of the Cinquecento. However, I do not ignore the conflicting historical backdrop against which the text was created. On the contrary, the expulsion of the Jews from the Iberian Peninsula (1492) and the sack of Rome by the troops of Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor (1527) are considered central to the development of the plot. These two major events are used by the author to establish his ideological agenda, which, in spite of being contradictory at times, offers an insightful perspective on the work both as a product and a representation of the culture of the "margin" of society. By "margin" I mean the culture of poverty, which, in this case, resists social, religious and literary conventions. The protagonist, Lozana, is fashioned as a conversa, humble in wealth and social status, who clearly transgresses the social norms of her time. A rebellious prostitute and medianera, she rejects the silence, the chastity and the seclusion (both at home and inside the brothel) imposed on her by a patriarchal society. One of the most distinctive features of Lozana's portrait is the paradoxical nature of her beauty and her sex appeal while she lacks her nose and has an apparent scar on her forehead. I argue that her deformed face symbolizes her segregation both in social and religious terms, and that this functions as a marker of Lozana's "otherness". Through an intriguing blend of fact and fiction, Delicado playfully scrutinizes multiple layers of society, and gives a voice to the often stifled speech of early modern "misfits".