Tucapel, de guerrero a gracioso: variaciones de un personaje araucano en el teatro del Siglo de Oro

Abstract

This article examines the different forms of dramatic construction of the Araucanian character of Tucapel in the following theatre plays: Arauco domado, by Lope de Vega; Los espanoles en Chile, by Francisco Gonzalez de Bustos; and La aurora en Copacabana, by Calderon de la Barca. From the epic model that Ercilla articulates in La Araucana and passing through the reinterpretation of the Chile's conquest wars that realizes Pedro de Ona in Arauco domado, the "cacique" Tucapel shows an interesting process of transformation and resemantization in which from rebel and untamed warrior becomes in comic "galan" and calderonian "gracioso". Through these dramatic variations it is possible to appreciate the fate of the "Matter of Arauco" in Spain, the literary reception of Ercilla's work in its generic transfer from epic to drama, and finally the vision of America, Chile and the Indians in the baroque theater of the seventeenth century