Tragedy Journal 10 (Blood Wedding Act 2)

Prompt: Personal convictions and shared beliefs, the private and the public life, sometimes seem at odds in the modern world. How did you find your chosen works touched on this conflict, and with what effect?



The play Blood Wedding by Federico Garcia Lorca offers several examples of these conflicts. Lorca shows this through private conversations between characters, for example the Bridegroom's mother forces herself to hold back her beliefs about her daughter in-law's family, "I ache down to the end of my veins! On all their faces, I see nothing but the hand that killed what was mine. [...] I am mad - from not having shouted out everything I needed to. I have a scream in my throat - always there - that I have to choke back and hide under my shawl. But they carry off the dead and you must keep silent. Or people will criticize" (Lorca 2.2). Even though the mother has a previous history with the other feuding family, she still holds back because of not only the bride's father advising her to, but also because of societal expectations of her not bringing up the subject during the wedding. (this ends up not working since the Bride elopes with Leonardo, and the Mother separates the guests into their respective feuding sides). Lorca seems to express a feeling of discontent when the truth is not revealed, but it seems to be also necessary to hide the truth until it is the appropriate time.



Ibsen demonstrates a similar idea through his play the Wild Duck, also with two families who instead have tensions between them due to financial issues.

GINA. Well, I think you ought to sleep on it first, anyway.

GREGERS. You're not very anxious to have me in the house, Mrs. Ekdal. [...]

HJALMAR. Yes, Gina, this is really peculiar of you. (Ibsen Act 2)

Gina herself is restricted similarly to the Mother in Blood Wedding, but instead is quieted by her husband, another male figure in the play. The comparison between the public views and private views are evident in Ibsen's plot which leads to a private conversation with Hjalmar and Gina about the hidden tensions between families. The truth of Gina's relationship with Werle results in the destruction of Hjalmar, and because of her personal motives to keep the family united clashed with Hjalmar's expectations of truth in their marraige, Ibsen attempts to express a sarcastic view on revealing the truth in everything.