Celestina Acts 1 - 10

Throughout the first half of the play, there are several quotes that stood out to me relating to love and desire that had been put into ways I had never heard or thought about before. Starting with Calisto in the first act, he asks, “and how may one who is out-of-tune tune? How may he who is himself so discordant know harmony, he whose will does not obey reason, who holds within his heard barbs, peace, war, truce, love, enmity, injuries, sins, suspicions, all from one cause?” In essence, Calisto has attributed all emotions he feels at this moment in time to love. From there, I found that the majority of the quotes could be placed into the categories of love in religion, a negative image of women, the illusion of loving a person, love causing pain, and prostitution.

LOVE IN RELIGION:

Religion becomes a commonly reference force in the play, first with, “As different as appearance from reality, as the real from the painted, as the shadow from the physical, that great the difference between the fire you speak of and the one that is burning me. But truly, if the fire of purgatory rages like this, I would rather my spirit be one with the brute beasts than suffer this torment to attain the glory of the saints.” But later and exchange between Sempronio and Calisto show an opposing side to religion, one where worship conflicts with love when love for a person overtakes love for God: Sempronio: “you are not a Christian?” Calisto: “I am a Melibean, and I worship Melibea and I put my faith in Melibea and I adore Melibea.” But Celestina is not quick to forget God’s role in all aspects of desire, “every day men suffer over women and women over men, and this is affected by nature and nature is commanded by God, and God does no evil.”

THE NEGATIVE IMAGE OF WOMEN

 

Later in the plot, love is downgraded from a human emotion and external force that causes both security, pleasure and pain, into something darker involving the role of women. In Sempronio’s eyes, women are not objects of love but objects of filth, similarly put by Matteiu’s servant in the Obscure Object of Desire, referring to women as sacks of excrement. Even farther, Sempronio advises Calisto to “Hear Solomon, where he says that women and wine make men deny God,” so in his opinion, women are an opposing force to God, or perhaps somehow related to Satan, used to drive man’s attention away from the holy, the good, the resplendent, into a world of gluttony, premarital sex and other sexual crimes, punishable by the church. He goes on to mention all of the negative attributes women hold: fickleness, argumentative, sharp tongued, deceitful, ungracious, likely to give false testimony, disdainful, gluttonous, wrathful and shameless. He does, however, mention that not all women are like this and that some are still virtuous. But the rest he describes as “cesspools beneath painted temples.”

THE ILLUSION OF LOVING A PERSON

In relation to the concepts discussed in class, Sempronio mentions to Calisto the prospect that the image of Melibea may be what he wants and that once he has her, he might not want her, “…and it might even be that you will abhor her as much as you love her now, once you possess her and will see her with different eyes, eyes free of the deception now in them.”

LOVE CAUSING PAIN

Through a long exchange, Parmeno urges Calisto to see the course of events that led to his pain and suffering through his desire (or love, it’s unknown at this time) for Melibea: “Senor, because the other day your fine falcon broke free and looking for it was the cause of your going into Melibea’s garden; your going in, the reason you saw and spoke to her. The talking engendered love; love gave birth to your pain; pain will cause you to lose your body and soul and estate. Yet what I regret even more is that you have fallen into the hands of that old convent trotter, who has been honeyed and feathered three times.” In this last statement, Parmeno is warning Calisto about his deal with Celestina in hopes of thwarting him from seeking love coaching or Celestina’s counsel.

Celestina, a woman who has a way with words, put the pains of love into, “love is a hidden fire, a pleasant wound, a delicious poison, a sweet bitterness, a delectable hurting, a happy torment, a sweet, fierce wound, a gentle death.” This wise old woman later speaks about the urgency felt by someone in love: “nothing is more normal for the lover than impatience. Every delay is torment for them, they take no pleasure from procrastination. They want to put their proposals into effect in no time at all, and would rather see them concluded than begun. These novice lovers fly off after any bait without a thought, not considering the harm that feeding their desire might bring to themselves and their servants.” While by this point in the play the viewer or reader has discovered Celestina’s plan to get as much money out of Calisto as possible, we cannot help but notice how incredibly intelligent she truly is. She has a way with convincing people to do whatever she needs them to by creating desires for them by the power of suggestion and then conveniently being able to help them attain whatever sexual desire they might have as a means to control them. 

PROSTITUTION

As the owner of a Brothel, Celestina is capable of finding potential in a young woman. In the 1400’s, as indicated in “Twilight Moments (Ch 5), prostitution was quite common and even controlled by the state in many circumstances. Women were forced into prostitution for having premarital sex or being raped. Often, girls were forced into prostitution if a brothel owner thought she would be a wise addition. During the play we see Celestina speaking to Areusa about how she keeps her beauty to herself. While Celestina’s intentions are unclear, it is safe to assume that this is how Celestina justifies prostitution, “God did not give them to you for you to waste the freshness of your youth beneath six folds of woolen and linen. Do not be miserly with what has cost you so little. Do not hoard your loveliness, for it is by its nature as good an exchange as money. Do not be the dog in the manager that no only does not eat but lets no one else eat either, and since you cannot enjoy your own beauty let he who can do so.”