Edmundson - The Heresy of Love

Helen Edmundson

THE HERESY
OF LOVE

NICK HERN BOOKS

London

www.nickhernbooks.co.uk

Contents

The Heresy of Love was revived at Shakespeares Globe, London, on 31 July 2015, with the following cast:

All other parts played by members of the company.

The Heresy of Love was first performed by the Royal Shakespeare Company in the Swan Theatre, Stratford-upon-Avon, on 2 February 2012, with the following cast:

All other parts played by members of the company.

For Jonathan, Edwin and Eleanor

Authors Note

Sor (Sister) Juana Ins de la Cruz is a conundrum: a nun who wrote comic plays and secular poetry; a beautiful woman who shut herself away from the eyes of men; one of the greatest intellects of her time who ended by renouncing her right to a life of the mind. I first became fascinated by her in 2004, after seeing a vibrant production of her play The House of Desires at the Swan Theatre in Stratford-upon-Avon. I went away and read everything I could find about her, and to my relief discovered that, whilst certain facts are known about her and there are several extant documents relating to her life, there remain many unanswered questions about her motivations, beliefs and the state of her heart. Here, then, was room for invention. I decided early on that I wanted to try to write about her rather as a seventeenth-century Spanish playwright might have done. The context and high drama of her story seemed to invite this. So I have luxuriated in intrigues and rivalries, in disguised identities and mischievous servants. I have made full use of the bold and sudden contrast of the comic and the dramatic, characteristic of the period, and enjoyed forging a rhythmic and heightened language. I also decided to place her faith at the centre of the play, as this enabled me to explore some complex and challenging questions. What happens when we try to modify a belief system to suit the way in which we want to live? Must religions remain orthodox to remain potent and in order to survive? And why silence the women? Questions as relevant in our world, I think, as they were in Sister Juanas.

Helen Edmundson

Characters

BISHOP SANTA CRUZ

FATHER ANTONIO

ARCHBISHOP AGUIAR Y SEIJAS

BRIGIDA

ANGELICA

JUANITA

SISTER SEBASTIANA

MOTHER MARGUERITA

SISTER JUANA

VICEROY

VICEREINE

DON HERNANDO

And NUNS, PRIESTS, MEMBERS OF THE COURT

ACT ONE

Scene One

The ARCHBISHOPs palace, Mexico City. Evening.

BISHOP SANTA CRUZ is alone in a room, waiting. FATHER ANTONIO enters.

FATHER ANTONIO. Santa Cruz.

SANTA CRUZ. Good evening, Father Antonio. So you are summoned too?

FATHER ANTONIO. Yes.

SANTA CRUZ. Do you know the cause? What matter is so urgent that it cannot keep until tomorrows council?

FATHER ANTONIO. I do not know. I was not told.

SANTA CRUZ. Yet not so urgent, it would seem, that we should not be forced to wait like uninvited tradesmen.

I think our new Archbishop does not sleep.

You know him well, I understand this Aguiar y Seijas.

FATHER ANTONIO. But there you are mistaken. Until I spoke to him today before his consecration I had met him only once: at Santiago de Compostela, at the university many years ago. He began his studies as I finished mine. He quickly gained a reputation for his fine, exacting mind, his unremitting discipline.

SANTA CRUZ. I heard that he is zealous.

FATHER ANTONIO. Zealous, yes, on points of faith. And yet its said that if hes sometimes harsh with others he is a great deal harsher with himself.

SANTA CRUZ. Some comfort then for Mexico.

FATHER ANTONIO. I hope you do not feel aggrieved, Santa Cruz.

SANTA CRUZ. Aggrieved?

FATHER ANTONIO. As Bishop of Puebla you might have assumed that you would be the next Archbishop of Mexico.

SANTA CRUZ. I did not agitate for the position, nor did I expect it.

FATHER ANTONIO. Even so. The trust, the intimacy which you shared with our late Archbishop, were reason, Im sure, for you to speculate.

SANTA CRUZ. I dared to hope, Ill grant you, yes, that my ten years devoted service to this land, my standing amongst the people and my peers, might recommend me for advancement. But there. He did not elect himself. I would not presume to doubt our learned brothers in Madrid were guided solely by the Lord to the decision which they made.

FATHER ANTONIO. And you will stay on in Puebla now?

SANTA CRUZ. I will stay on in Puebla, yes. I will stay on in Puebla. Puebla is my diocese, my charge.

I am not governed by my pride.

ARCHBISHOP AGUIAR Y SEIJAS enters.

(Standing and bowing.) Your Grace.

ARCHBISHOP. Let us dispense with ceremony, the occasion does not warrant it.

SANTA CRUZ. Only allow me to extend, on behalf of the people of Puebla and myself, a heartfelt welcome to this great city of Mexico, and to this new and burgeoning land, so keenly desirous of your guidance and your love.

ARCHBISHOP. That this land is in need of guidance, I have no doubt, Santa Cruz. In your heartfelt welcome I find it harder to believe. I was born, you see, without imagination.