Gabriel Téllez ( 24 March 1583 20 February 1648), better known as Tirso de Molina, was a Spanish Baroque dramatist, poet and Roman Catholic monk. He is primarily known for writing The Trickster of Seville and the Stone Guest, the play from which the popular character of Don Juan originates. His work is also of particular significance due to the abundance of female protagonists, as well as the exploration of sexual issues.
Life and career
He was born in Madrid. He studied at Alcalá de Henares, joined the mendicant Order of the Blessed Virgin Mary of Mercy on 4 November 1600, and entered the Monastery of San Antolín at Guadalajara, Spain on 21 January 1601. He had been ordained a priest by 1610.
He had been writing plays for ten years when he was sent by his superiors on a mission to the West Indies in 1615; residing in Santo Domingo from 1616 to 1618 and returning to Europe in 1618, he resided at the Mercedarian monastery in Madrid, took part in the proceedings of the Academia poetica de Madrid, founded by Sebastián Francisco de Medrano, competed in the literary tournaments then in vogue, and wrote copiously for the stage.
His first publication, the incomplete Cigarrales de Toledo (licensed in 1621, but not published till 1624), is a miscellany of short tales, novellas, verses and three plays. One of the novellas, Los tres maridos burlados, probably derived from Francesco Cieco da Ferrara's Mambriano, and the play entitled El vergonzoso en palacio reveal his wit and ingenuity. The preface to the Cigarrales de Toledo states that Tirso de Molina had already written three hundred plays, and at this period of his career he was second only to Lope de Vega in popularity. (Tirso de Molina was one of Lope's most ardent followers.)
He showed hostility to culteranismo in the Cigarrales de Toledo, and made numerous enemies by his attacks on the new school in such pieces as Amar por arte mayor and La celosa de si misma. The realistic character of some of his productions gave his rivals an excuse to denounce him as a corrupter of public morals to the council of Castile in 1625, and, though no legal action was taken against him, he appears to have been reprimanded privately. In 1626 it was thought advisable to transfer him to Salamanca, and Tirso de Molina left Madrid determined to write no more for the stage. Though one of his plays, La huerta de San Juan, is dated 1626, there is no proof that it was begun after his departure from Madrid, and he seems to have written nothing for eight years.
He had not lost his interest in the theatre, and published twelve representative pieces as the first part of his dramatic works (1626). This was a formal protest against the weakness of those who had been persuaded to drive him out. On the other hand, he worked zealously on behalf of his order, and rose to an important position; he became superior of the monastery at Trujillo in 1626, was elected later to the posts of reader in theology and definidor general, and in May 1632 was appointed chronicler of the Order of Mercy. His Deleitar aprovechando (1635) is a devout counterpart of the Cigarrales de Toledo, much inferior to its predecessor in interest; a sequel was promised to this collection of pious tales, pious lyrics, and autos, but, as in the case of the Cigarrales de Toledo, the continuation never appeared.