A Sor Juana Anthology by Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz

First published: 1988

Type of work: Essays and poetry

Form and Content

A Sor Juana Anthology is a collection of some of the best poetry of Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz, along with a sample of her poetic drama and prose, selected by Mexican poet and essayist Octavio Paz and translator Alan S. Trueblood. Since her poetry is the heart of her achievement, it forms the major part of the anthology, divided to indicate general themes and type of verse: convent and court, vicarious love, music, divine love, self and the world, lighter pieces, and festive worship (villancicos). Sor Juana’s work clearly places her among Spanish poets of the Baroque in the tradition of Luis de Góngora and Pedro Calderón de la Barca. Her lyrical poetry was praised for its ingenious use of conventional forms: decorative and exotic imagery, symbolism, hyperbole, antithesis, paradox, and references to philosophy, science, and other areas of learning. The modern reader, however, may occasionally sense an individual voice behind the conventions and appreciate glimpses of Sor Juana’s struggles to express herself artistically under the constraints of being a woman in seventeenth century Mexico.

Sor Juana’s poetic drama is exemplified by excerpts from El divino Narciso (c. 1680; The Divine Narcissus, 1945), a series of allegorical tableaux in which human nature reveals her quest of Christ in the form of Narcissus. As an auto sacramental (one-act play celebrating the Eucharist), it is considered a masterpiece.

“First Dream” (1692), Sor Juana’s longest and most important poem, is included in its entirety and expresses the search for knowledge that ultimately ends in disillusionment. Using the account of a dream remembered during waking hours, Sor Juana focuses on the question of human aspiration for knowledge and understanding of the world. She demonstrates a wide range of scholarship herself, including philosophical and literary illusions, and incorporates the various images of sleep that would have been well known by her audience: contrast of night and day, sleep as death and as having dominion over human beings, and the deceptiveness of dreams.

At the end of the anthology, Sor Juana’s famous justification of her pursuit of knowledge, “The Reply to Sor Philothea” (1691), is included. Upon this famous manuscript rests much of Sor Juana’s reputation as a feminist. After recognizing her own overpowering desire to know and indicating how she learns not only from books but also from everyday life, she argues the case for allowing women to study. The form shows, first of all, the conventions of her time, including formulas of humility and Latin citations as well as references to Scripture. She uses scholastic argumentation and demonstrates her ability to reveal the interrelated character of fields of study. Taking information from various sources, Sor Juana compiles her argument with skill and astuteness, justifying her studies as a means of understanding Scripture better. To the criticism that she should study more sacred works, she readily agrees—although her letter reveals that she already knows much about the Bible and religious writers. Her questioning, searching mind is apparent in her careful and well-formulated argument. It is clear that she was often misunderstood—and opposed—within her convent community because of her need to study and her belief that women, like men, should be allowed full intellectual development.

Context

Although Sor Juana is recognized today as an outstanding poet of Mexico’s colonial period, her work reflects the life of an intelligent woman who was not nurtured in this endeavor by her seventeenth century environment. Not allowed to attend the university, she was essentially self-taught, and her work is the product of a searching mind which enjoyed scholarly activity. The very existence of this work is a great accomplishment.

In conflict with society’s expectations of a woman of her time, Sor Juana nevertheless found a way to develop her talent. Since education was a prerogative of the Catholic church, she entered the convent of Santa Paula, of the Hieronymite Order, in 1669. Her religious duties seem to have been compatible with a very active scholastic life. Sometimes celebrated as an early feminist, Sor Juana gave voice to the idea that women did not need to remain ignorant. A villancico for the Saint’s Day of Catherine of Alexandria (1691) uses the humorous tone of the common people in telling the story of Catherine, who “knew a lot, so they say,/ though she was female.” Fortunately, this did not present a problem: “The makings of sainthood/ was in her, they say;/ even knowing so much/ didn’t get in her way.” Humor was used again in her famous poem on the double standard (“Silly, you men—so very adept/ at wrongly faulting womankind”), in which she points out that men criticize women regardless of how they act: If they spurn men, they are ungrateful; if they succumb to their advances, they are lewd.

Sor Juana’s decision regarding marriage may have been influenced by the fact that she was illegitimate and had no dowry. It is clear, however, that her greatest passion was intellectual, and her choice of the convent can be seen in that light. As she argues in “The Reply to Sor Philothea,” she had a vocation which could not be denied. Her explanation and defense of learning are written all the more frankly as she did not expect the letter to be published. Continued opposition within her community and as the loss of the protective support of a patron in Mexico made Sor Juana’s life more difficult after the publication of “The Reply to Sor Philothea.” In 1692, with the pressures of hunger riots and the resulting demands for penitential acts, she was increasingly isolated and in 1693 wrote a document of repentance herself. In the last two years of her life, she wrote nothing. Nevertheless, readers discovering her work today find a body of lyric poetry that confirms her stature as an important poet of the seventeenth century, as well as writings, including “The Reply to Sor Philothea,” which are testament to a strong woman’s need to understand her world and give expression to her discoveries.

Bibliography

Flynn, Gerard. Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz. Boston: Twayne, 1971. A readable introduction to the life of Sor Juana and her work. Selections of her poetry and both secular and religious drama are reviewed, with quotations from the texts. (English translations are provided.) Includes helpful explanatory notes to each chapter and a bibliography with mainly Spanish-language sources.

Merrim, Stephanie, ed. Feminist Perspectives on Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz. Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1991. Eight articles explore from a feminist perspective each of the genres in which Sor Juana wrote, also discussing her cultural climate and personal pressures. Of particular interest are the introductory essay on key issues in Sor Juana criticism and readings of “First Dream,” “The Reply to Sor Philothea,” and selected love poetry. Offers a brief bibliography, including English editions of her work, and a chronology.

Montross, Constance M. Virtue or Vice? Sor Juana’s Use of Thomistic Thought. Washington, D.C.: University Press of America, 1981. Examines Sor Juana’s use of Scholastic doctrine and methodology, specifically the ideas of Saint Thomas Aquinas. The author analyzes the combination of belief and questioning in “First Dream” and “The Reply to Sor Philothea.” An extensive bibliography is provided, as well as the full Spanish text of “First Dream.”

Paz, Octavio, ed. Mexican Poetry: An Anthology. Translated by Samuel Beckett. Reprint. New York: Grove Press, 1985. Complements Paz’s Sor Juana: Or, The Traps of Faith with a discussion in the introduction of Sor Juana’s place in the history of Mexican poetry. The anthology includes translations of twelve of her poems.

Paz, Octavio. Sor Juana: Or, The Traps of Faith. Translated by Margaret Sayers Peden. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1988. An important biography of Sor Juana emphasizing her uniqueness as a poet and her struggle for an intellectual and creative life. Particular focus is on the key questions of why she entered a convent and why she renounced learning at the end of her life. Considers historical settings and traditions in some detail, with illustrations including portraits of Sor Juana. A helpful listing of Spanish literary terms is provided.

Royer, Fanchón. The Tenth Muse: Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz. Paterson, N.J.: St. Anthony Guild Press, 1952. A good introductory source. Each chapter begins with a translated quote from Sor Juana’s work and presents the basic biographical facts along with interpretive commentary. The appendix contains selected poems in Spanish, as well as a short bibliography of Spanish-language sources.