THE GRACIOSO

The history of the gracioso has been much studied and often debated. There is no question that this nearly indispensable stock figure is born from a number of definite literary precedents, yet how much influence each precedent exerts has always been a point of contention. The issues of origins are likely never to be settled because, despite being a stock type, the gracioso figure demonstrates amazing flexibility and variation in behaviour, and boasts a freedom of action and attitude that far exceeds any found in the other standard characters within the comedia genre. Nevertheless, critics still ascribe various attributes to the type. The gracioso’s literary antecedent, the simple (in turn related to the pastor bobo) is simple-minded, materialistic, a glutton and a coward. The gracioso is invariably considered to share these attributes. However, when one considers influences outside the Spanish Renaissance farsas and pasos, one can see that earthiness is far from a restricting character trait. The more general bobo de entremés (who may or may not be a pastor) has been compared to the servus and the parasite of Roman comedy. The clever lackey of Italo-classical plays, different in some ways from the Roman type, was also undoubtedly an influence. Naturally, the commedia dell’arte, with its zanni and their lazzi, must have also had an impact on the development of this Spanish theatrical figure.

One must also take into account the various traditions of fools that are so commonly associated with the gracioso. We may think of the trickster of Carnival time, the fool as the representative embodiment of materialist indulgence in the ‘lower stratum’ as described by Bakhtin. But the fool is also a permanent figure at court, and his jokes, antics and occasional jabs at the powerful can often be compared to the cracks made by the comedia charactertype. The immunity shared by both Carnival and court fools must bear some relation to the freedom of expression granted to the gracioso, which includes berating the amo and constantly rupturing the dramatic illusion in order to speak directly to the audience. This rapport with the viewing public that the gracioso enjoys can be likened to the extra-textual commentaries made by the prólogos and introitos of old, which brings us back to both Roman Comedy and the later pastor-bobo figure of religious plays.