Fashioning the Deviant Male Body in Tomás de Iriarte\'s _El señorito mimado o la mala educación_

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Romance Notes, Volume 55, Number 2, 2015, pp. 163-175 (Article) 3XEOLVKHGE\7KH'HSDUWPHQWRI5RPDQFH/DQJXDJHVDQG/LWHUDWXUHV 7KH8QLYHUVLW\RI1RUWK&DUROLQDDW&KDSHO+LOO

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FaShIonIng ThE DEvIanT MaLE boDy In ToMÁS DE IrIarTE’S EL sEñoRito mimado o La maLa EducaciÓN nIChoLaS a. WoLTErS

ToMÁS de Iriarte (1750-1791), most often celebrated for his imaginative and innovative treatment of the fable in his Fábulas literarias (1782), was also a cosmopolitan playwright, satirist and translator who was a constituent member of Madrid’s artistic and literary scene during the second half of the eighteenth century along with his contemporaries José Cadalso, Leandro Fernández  de  Moratín,  ramón  de  la  Cruz,  and  Francisco  de  goya.1 his  original comedies – such as El señorito mimado o la mala educación (1787) and La señorita malcriada (1788) – were immediately recognized and well received for their finely tuned and versified representations of Spanish society, as well as for their incorporation of neoclassical aesthetics and theatrical reforms.2 In El señorito mimado,  which  enjoyed  a  particularly  “thunderous  reception” (Cox 240) upon its first staging in 1788, Iriarte lampoons the improper and insubstantial  education  of  Madrid’s  idle  youth  exemplified  by  the  foppish 1 For  a  detailed  discussion  of  Iriarte’s  cosmopolitanism  and  literary  influences,  consult Sebold’s 1986 edition of El señorito mimado and La señorita malcriada (“Introducción biográfica y crítica” 57-66), along with his 2010 edition of Iriarte’s complete theatrical works (“Introducción” 56-75). See Fernández for a contrary analysis that privileges Iriarte’s originality over discussions of his potential afrancesamiento or French influences. 2 Leandro Fernández de Moratín, author of La comedia nueva o el café (1792) and El sí de las niñas (1801), credits Iriarte’s El señorito mimado o la mala educación as the first original Spanish  comedy  for  its  application  of  neoclassical  reforms  in  the  eighteenth-century  Spanish theatre: “Si ha de citarse la primera comedia original que se ha visto en los teatros de España, escrita según las reglas más esenciales, que han dictado la filosofía y la buena crítica, es ésta” (qtd. in Sebold, “Introducción” 57). Menéndez Pelayo would later echo Moratín’s praise of Iriarte:  “Cuando  abre  uno  el  teatro  de  D. Tomás  de  Iriarte  y  tropieza  con  sus  bien  arregladas  y bien  escritas  comedias  El señorito mimado y  La señorita malcriada [.  .  .],  es  la  comedia  de Molière cayendo en manos mejor intencionadas y más burguesas” (qtd. in Sebold, “Introducción” 57). Consult Cox for an analysis of the topic of neoclassical reform in Iriarte’s adaptations, translations, and original comedies.

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Don Mariano.3 In the most recent analyses of the comedy, critics have focused on topics ranging from its aesthetic, historical, and political context (andioc, Sebold),  Iriarte’s  literary  influences  (Cox),  as  well  as  its  treatment  of  the themes of letter writing (Fueger) and marriage (McCallahan). however, the role of bodily comportment and dress in the fashioning of Mariano’s deviant masculine character has yet to be explored, despite the visibility Iriarte gives to these subjects in his comedy.4 In this article, I will highlight a new context in which to read Iriarte’s El señorito mimado o la mala educación. In the comedy, Mariano’s characteristic  indeterminacy  and  transgressive  attitudes  vis-à-vis  hegemonic  figures  of patriarchal  authority  – embodied  by  his  virtuous  uncle  Don  Cristóbal  – are sartorially coded, and problematize the facile categorization and diagnosis of his deviant attributes and behavior. Throughout El señorito mimado, Mariano operates as an agent of class transvestism by donning the modish signifiers of both the petimetre – an upper-class fop – and the majo – a working-class representative  of  Spanish  tradition  or  casticismo,  blending  and  confusing  both types  and  their  respective  paradigms  of  dress.  This  confusion  of  otherwise distinctive male garments highlights the permeability of the terms and types to which they refer, along with the porous nature of social boundaries at the turn  of  the  century.  Indeed,  the  concomitant  visual  markers  associated  with the  petimetre (morning  suits,  canes,  watches)  and  the  majo (capes,  broad hats), along with the types themselves, were in constant flux throughout the eighteenth century in Spain. In providing a new lens through which to analyze Iriarte’s comedy, I argue that frequent references to items of male fashion  index  eighteenth-century  anxieties  concerning  appropriate  masculine behavior and bodily comportment, along with the growing instability of recognizable social hierarchies and modes of representation and signification. It should  be  emphasized  that  such  anxieties  were  rendered  possible  by  “the unstable,  precarious  position  of  masculinity  in  societies  that  long  held  the masculine  to  be  a  natural,  stable  marker  of  superiority  over  the  feminine” 3 El señorito mimado debuted on September 9, 1788 in the Teatro del Príncipe. according to Sebold, the play earned 5,074 reales during its first production, more than twice that of the shows  from  the  previous  two  days  in  the  same  theatre,  and  was  shown  for  nine  consecutive days (“Introducción” 31). 4 Such an analysis is also warranted due to an increasing interest in writings about the body and fashion in the eighteenth century in Spain as evidenced by the recent publication of monographs exploring the topics of the body, fashion, and masculinity in the discursive figures of the petimetre, the hombre de bien, and the majo. See, for example, haidt (1998, 2011), Díaz-Marcos  (2006),  gómez-Castellano  (2012),  and  Penrose  (2014). amann  (2015)  makes  a  case  for reexamining  discourses  surrounding  the  currutaco,  despite  a  tendency  in  literary  criticism  to conflate this type with the petimetre (253, n12).

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(Penrose,  masculinity 9).  Sartorial  signifiers  in  El señorito mimado – especially  those  indicated  by  stage  directions  – and  contemporaneous  literary texts  and  discourses  will  confirm  and  give  contour  to  these  underlying  tensions concerning the potential threat of subversive masculinities that disrupt models of gentlemanly, virtuous masculinity (hombría de bien) promoted by eighteenth-century moralists like Iriarte. In other words, deviant masculinity – one  that  distorts  and  evades  the  ideal  forms  embodied  by  the  hombre de bien – manifests  itself  in  Iriarte’s  play  as  a  class  transvestism  in  which  the protagonist oscillates and shifts between the sartorial markers of the sexually deviant petimetre and the socially marginalized, working-class majo. The  comedy’s  title  refers  to  Mariano’s  – el señorito’s  – inchoate  masculinity: he is neither a child nor an adult. In an early conversation with his mother  Doña  Dominga  in  the  second  act  of  the  play,  Mariano  complains about  the  childish  treatment  he  receives  from  his  elders,  specifically  referencing  Don  Cristóbal’s  desire  to  discipline  him  as  if  he  were  a  child  or “muñeco”: “ya empieza / a quererme gobernar / lo mismo que si yo fuera / algún muñeco” (vv. 1122-1125).5 Iriarte’s use of the word muñeco in describing Mariano is particularly apt in a conversation interested in exploring the intersections  of  fashion  and  deviant  masculinity  in  El señorito mimado.  In 1734, the word alluded to a doll or child’s toy (“la figura pequeña de hombre hecha  de  pasta,  madera,  trapos  u  otra  cosa”)  as  well  as  an  effeminate  man who  lacked  agency  (“el  hombre  afeminado,  afeitado  y  compuesto  como muger  [sic]:  o  el  que  es  pequeño,  atado  y  sin  expedición”)  (“Muñeco”). Throughout the play Mariano, too, is subject to the disciplinary mechanisms and  temptations  of  eighteenth-century  Spanish  society,  as  well  as  the  inappropriate feminine influences of his mother and Doña Mónica. The  conflict  between  Mariano’s  desire  to  transgress  authority  and  the desires  on  the  part  of  authority  figures  like  his  uncle  to  manipulate  him  by way of disciplinary and educational measures highlight the señorito’s body as a veritable battleground for external forces of power. In discipline and Punish, Michel Foucault explores the body as susceptible to modes of correction in old regime France, speaking similarly of the docile body and its malleability before mechanisms of authority that attempt to exercise and exert control over  it:  “a  body  is  docile  that  may  be  subjected,  used,  transformed  and improved” (136). Mariano’s docility, though, is both the problem and the solution.  his  bad  habits,  effeminacy  or  “feminine  morphology”  (Foucault,  the use of Pleasure 18)  must  be  effaced  in  order  for  the  hands  of  hegemonic, masculine authority to impress upon him the acceptable virtues of virile self5

all textual citations refer to Sebold’s 1986 edition of El señorito mimado.

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governance and restraint. rebecca haidt’s definition of the body echoes Foucault’s,  according  to  which  it  is  “an  entity  elaborated  through  texts,  laws, institutions and images assembled within discourses conditioning the sorts of narratives possible about bodies within a period of time and a cultural milieu” (6).  In  Iriarte’s  play,  the  clothed  or  dressed  body  is  a  locus  for  competing notions of authority, desire, and transgression, where dress should be viewed as  “a  comprehensive  term  to  identify  both  direct  body  changes  and  items added  to  the  body”  (Eicher  and  roach-higgins  15). Taking  into  account  the narrative dressing of a character’s body is vital to understanding the ways in which eighteenth-century audiences might have perceived him. as the editors of  Fashion in Fiction remark,  “[w]hat  a  character  wears  and  how  he  or  she carries his or her clothes speak to the reader in ways that a character’s spoken words rarely could” (Mcneil, Karaminas, and Cole 6). however the legibility of  sartorial  signifiers  is  complicated  by  Mariano’s  transgressive  behavior  in that  he  adopts  the  dress  of  both  the  upper-class  petimetre and  the  workingclass majo in an effort to dodge the surveillance of his uncle and polite society by way of class transvestism. In this way, Iriarte’s señorito subverts categories and “puts into question identities previously conceived as stable, unchallengeable, grounded, and ‘known’” (garber 13).  The petimetre and the majo were popular stock characters or figurones of eighteenth-century  Spanish  theater  frequently  utilized  by  Spanish  writers throughout the eighteenth century. They were perennially the targets of criticism and ridicule from the normalizing vantage point of enlightened moralists,  journalists,  novelists  and  the  rest  of  polite  society.  both  the  petimetre and the majo appeared on the stage of eighteenth-century playwrights outfitted  in  signifiers  that  emphasized  their  difference  from  socially  acceptable forms of masculinity, such as the civil and respectable hombre de bien, where “[e]ach  word  expressed  a  well-known  complex  of  dress,  gesture,  and  conduct:  on  the  stage,  characters  were  typically  given  such  spare  directions  as sale muy petimetre [. . .] or de majas [. . .]” (noyes 199). Though each word connoted particular networks of sign and symbol, it is especially important to note  that  the  terms  themselves  were  never  fixed  and  manifest  themselves dynamically in El señorito mimado and the other texts discussed alongside it. haidt, for example, alludes to the heterogeneous character of the majo from its  beginnings  as  “un  emblema  clave  para  la  movilidad  característica  de  la ciudad  [Madrid],  donde  se  mezclaban  costumbres  y  personas  locales  e importadas, donde la tradición y la innovación se cruzaban constantemente” (Los majos 157).  This  terminological  dynamism  is  energized  by  Mariano’s mutable character – he is never identified explicitly as a petimetre or a majo, but is rather conflated with these two types in his donning of their respective

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trappings:  “Don  Mariano  llega  vestido  en  traje  de  por  la  mañana,  con  bastoncito de petimetre, etc.”; “[. . .] Don Mariano, vestido de majo y embozado con capote a la jerezana.” In  the  eighteenth  century,  the  petimetre was  viewed  as  “[e]l  joven  que cuida  demasiadamente  de  su  compostura,  y  de  seguir  las  modas”  (“Petimetre”) and was often typecast as intolerably effeminate and prone to spending inappropriate  amounts  of  money  on  the  latest  Parisian  fashions  and  other frivolities  traditionally  associated  with  women.6 Mariano  is  frequently aligned with this character, particularly with regards to his expenses: “aquí verá usted prodigios / de esplendidez: francachelas / en casas de campo, en fondas; / crédito abierto en las tiendas de mercaderes, modistas; muchos tiros de colleras / para fiestas de novillos [. . .]” (vv. 1595-1601). The term derives from  the  French  petit-maître,  which  carries  a  doubly  negative  connotation once  transliterated  to  Spanish  as  petimetre,  alluding  to  a  sense  of  otherness both in gender and nationality. The capricious petimetre embodies moral and social decadence and stands in stark contrast to the hombre de bien, who is often portrayed as the embodiment of hegemonic masculine virtue and valor. Unlike  the  petimetre,  who  effectively  desires  to  differentiate  himself  from others,  the  hombre de bien was  considered  a  virtuous  member  of  the  upper classes  who  “displayed  evidence  of  the  masculine  virtue  he  has  attained through control of his body and inclinations” (haidt, Embodying 151). Mariano’s rival Don Fausto upholds particularly well this notion of a gentleman among equals, explicitly stating that “[n]adie debe / singularizarse” (v. 923924).7 This  was  precisely  the  message  spread  by  eighteenth-century  moralists,  who  emphasized  that  self-restraint  and  the  avoidance  of  excess  should “manifest itself on the male body in the form of simple unaffected dress and composed  mien”  (haidt,  Embodying 117).  however  the  avoidance  of  pleasure  altogether  was  not  the  sole  modus operandi of  men  who  preached  the ideal of the hombre de bien. Despite it being the discursive ideal of masculinity  in  texts  from  Cadalso’s  cartas marruecas (1789) to  Iriarte’s  comedies, the  concept  of  hombría de bien should  also  be  understood  as  a  mobile  one that  was  never  static  in  meaning,  as  has  been  argued  recently  by  Irene gómez-Castellano.8 While  the  petimetre spent  time  openly  parading  about 6 articles  published  in  El censor refer  to  petimetres and  pisaverdes as:  “muñecos  [.  .  .] oprobio de los barbados” and “jembra [sic] vestía de hombre” (qtd. in Díaz Marcos 85). 7 Mariano  claims  to  be  following  the  model  of  any  number  of  young  men  in  Madrid: “¿acaso / me singularizo yo? / vivo como tantos / que hay por Madrid . . .” (vv. 924-27). 8 Irene  gómez-Castellano’s  recent  book La cultura de las máscaras effectively  blurs  and complicates the notion of hombría de bien, and suggests that virtuous gentlemen simply knew how and where to enact their escapist desire while still striving to be the “ciudadano que sacrifica su bienestar individual en aras del bien común” (25).

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with expensive foreign clothing and watches, the hombre de bien abided by the  pronouncements  of  eighteenth-century  moralists  who  echoed  classical authors  and  affirmed  the  virtuousness  of  simplicity  and  moderation  in  matters  of  behavior,  dress,  pleasure  and  entertainment  in  the  public  sphere (haidt,  Embodying 117).9 however  the  petimetre refuses  to  take  part  in  the performance of so-called heteronormative conventions. Such behavior is evidenced  by  Mariano,  who  eludes  a  proper  education  by  tutors  hand-selected by Don Cristóbal, and avoids marriage with Doña Flora, daughter of the gentlemanly Don alfonso. In a suggestive study entitled masculinity and Queer desire in spanish Enlightenment Literature,  Mehl  Penrose  argues  that  “the petimetre came  to  represent  Spain’s  internalization  of  gender  and  sexual queerness through his repeated appearances that emphasized the monstrous, excessive,  foreign,  and  effete”  (14).  Though  Mariano  is  never  labeled  a petimetre per  se,  undertones  of  sexual  nonconformity  at  work  in  his  absent desire  to  enact  the  expectations  of  enlightened  thinkers  was  perhaps  reinforced for contemporary audiences by the allusion of his name to the pejorative marión, which was a term levied against men suspected of sodomy. The association  of  his  character  with  what  Mehl  Penrose  calls  “coded  vocabulary” (masculinity 26), such as Mariano’s name or the “bastoncito de petimetre,” might have made Iriarte’s audiences and readers privy to a kind of gender non-conformity that was implied rather than boldly or explicitly stated.10 There is a definite concern on the part of Mariano’s uncle Don Cristóbal for his  nephew  to  cast  aside  that  which  distinguishes  him  in  order  to  embody recognizable male virtues, such as self-discipline and restraint, which would effectively  identify  him  as  the  hombre de bien everyone  in  polite  society wants him to be. If  the  petimetre embodies  the  effeminate  aristocratic  man  and  antithesis of  the  gentlemanly  hombre de bien,  the  majo can  be  found  at  the  opposite end of the economic spectrum of fashionable masculinity as a working-class agent of hyper-masculine, castizo “Spanishness.” Though this is at least partially  the  case  in  literary  practice,  eighteenth-century  definitions  of  majo allude to an important point of comparison with the petimetre, which is his reliance on affect in his self-fashioning. The majo is “[e]l hombre que afecta guapeza y valentía en las acciones o palabras. Comúnmente llaman así a los que  viven  en  los  arrabales  de  esta  Corte”  (“Majo”).  The  major  difference between the two characters is their social ranking. In other words, both stock 19 Quintillian wrote that orators should avoid “excessive care with regard to the cut of the toga [. . .] or the arrangement of the hair” (qtd. in haidt, Embodying 117). 10 Interestingly, El señorito mimado was performed between February 15 and February 26, 1791 by an entirely female cast (Sebold, “Introducción 31).

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figures  performed  an  exaggerated  kind  of  masculinity,  or  at  least  one  that exceeded  the  limits  of  ideal  types  of  respectable  masculinity  predicated  on moderation  and  self-discipline;  though  only  aristocrats  could  be  labeled petimetres,  and  “authentic”  or  “real”  majos were  peopled  by  the  laboring classes. This is of course complicated by the fact that young aristocrats were prone to dressing up with the vestments traditionally worn by the lower class majo, as is evident in El señorito mimado, goya’s paintings (El pelele), and other  eighteenth-century  cultural  productions,  such  as  Jovellanos’s  poem entitled “Sátira segunda a arnesto.” majos were just as concerned with their appearance  as  petimetres and  wore  a  costume  that  included  a  “hair  net, broad-brimmed  soft  hat,  and  long  cloak,  all  black  or  brown”  which  was “worn with one side flung across the front over the shoulder, and the hat brim often pulled down, leaving very little of the wearer’s face exposed; this menacing  posture  was  characteristic”  (noyes  199).  Part  of  the  problem  with majos, from the perspective of Spanish authorities, was their knack for concealment in the ample folds of dark cloaks and hats that covered their faces. hermetic classification between discrete types was problematized by a variety  of  social  circumstances  in  the  second  half  of  the  eighteenth  century  in Madrid, when aristocrats began participating in a class transvestism according to which they adopted the sartorial habits of the lower classes, challenging the authority of the normalizing gaze and traditional ways of observing and understanding the station of a growing number of city dwellers: “From the  1760s,  the  Spanish  nobility  began  to  discover  in  the  majos a  model  of resistance and a habit of self-assertion more congenial than the accommodating courtesies of the petimetre. In order to mix more readily at popular festivals and entertainments, they began to wear majo costume” (noyes 202). In an effort to combat this type of class confusion, Carlos III’s minister banned the use of the majo cloak (capa or capote) and hat. This was one of the major events that contributed to the large-scale provocation of the Esquilache riots of  1766.11 articles  of  clothing  associated  with  the  majo were  targeted  for their strong associations with crime and vagrancy even attested to by foreign visitors  to  Spain  and  contemporary  enlightened  critics  of  the  idleness  – whether actual or perceived – of the working classes (noyes 206-08). Indeed, 11 The  edict  stipulated  that  no  person  of  any  social  class  wear  any  item  of  clothing  that camouflaged  or  disguised  his  or  her  face:  “Para  que  ninguna  persona,  de  cualesquier  estado, grado o distinción que fuese, desde la publicación del vando, fuese, ni concurriese, a pie, ni en coche, embozado con capa larga, montera, o sombrero o gorro calado, ni otro género de embozo que le cubriese el rostro, para no ser conocido en los sitios y parajes públicos de esta corte, señalando por tales los teatros de comedias, paseos públicos, procesiones y festejos populares [. . .]” (qtd. in Medina Domínguez 146-47).

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class  transvestism  threatened  to  deteriorate  and  undermine  predetermined social boundaries. In the first half of Jovellanos’s 1787 “Sátira segunda a arnesto,” subtitled “Sobre la mala educación de la nobleza,” the narrator laments the decadence of  Spanish  majismo and  condemns  the  type  of  aristocratic  gentlemen  who wear the clothing associated with the majo, emphasizing the sartorial composition of their character: “¿ves, arnesto, aquel majo en siete varas / de pardomonte  envuelto,  con  patillas  /  de  tres  pulgadas  afeado  el  rostro,  /  magro, pálido y sucio, que al arrimo / de la esquina de enfrente nos acecha / con aire sesgo y baladí?” (vv. 1-6). Though this article deals principally with discursive and literary types, it is worth noting that this genre of class-defying men existed in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Madrid according to some historians. The Conde de Toreno, for example, reported that one marquis “era [. . .] el  ídolo  de  la  plebe  madrileña;  presumía  de  imitarla  en  usos  y  traeres;  con nadie sino con ella se trataba, y aun casi siempre se le veía vestido a su manera con el traje de majo” (qtd. in Caso gonzález 238, n4). This is the case in El señorito mimado, a play in which an aristocratic gentleman dons the garbs of a lower class worker in order to rub elbows with gamblers and miscreants, all  while  subverting  and  transgressing  against  the  virtuous  community  of gentlemen.  The  aristocracy’s  adoption  of  lower-class  sartorial  signifiers effectively  confused  old  regime  class  hierarchies  and  otherwise  normative or  traditional  systems  of  signification,  where  the  signs  associated  with  the clothed  body  no  longer  necessarily  corresponded  to  or  communicated  the existence of an acceptable, essential or normative version of self. The most important references made to dress in Iriarte’s play are in stage directions for Mariano, and his uncle Don Cristóbal, which speaks to the particular importance of men’s fashion in coding appropriate and deviant masculine  behavior.  Mariano’s  docility  and  absorption  of  improper  desires  and habits, such as a fear of duendes and an aversion to a meaningful work ethic, identify him with similar figures in the Spanish literary canon, such as Fray gerundio de Campazas. In the first act of Iriarte’s play, Mariano’s identity is constituted  by  conversations  between  his  uncle  Don  Cristóbal,  his  mother Doña Dominga, and the house’s servants Felipa and Pantoja. Don Cristóbal, informed not only by the servants of the household but also by Don Fausto and  his  eventual  father-in-law  Don alfonso,  paints  the  negative  portrait  of Mariano, using the diminutive of caballero (caballerito) to criticize indirectly his ignorance and inchoate masculinity: “es que ese caballerito / cumplirá presto veinte años / sin saber ni persignarse; / que está lleno de resabios, / de mil preocupaciones; / que es temoso, afeminado, / superficial, insolente, / enemigo del trabajo; / incapaz de sujetarse / a seguir por ningún ramo / una car-

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rera decente” (vv. 111-121). at the end of this very long description detailing his  behaviors  and  expenditures,  Mariano  finally  enters  the  scene  dressed  in sartorial  signifiers  that  would  have  explicitly  identified  his  character  as  a petimetre: “D. Mariano llega vestido en traje de por la mañana, con un bastoncito de petimetre, etc. Sale por la puerta de la izquierda, dirigiéndose con alguna aceleración a entrar por la de en medio. viene cantando entre dientes, y  se  suspende  al  ver  a  D.  Fausto”  (183).12 andioc  also  confirms  that  Mariano’s aristocratic status and his “bastoncito” equate him early on with the petimetre paradigm (510, n11). as in other representations of the petimetre, Mariano appears to be a vain and  materialistic  young  fop  who  simply  wishes  to  parade  about  while  being doted  upon  passively.  The  ease  and  pomp  with  which  Mariano  enters  the scene stands in stark contrast to the previously introduced characters such as Don Cristóbal, highlighting the disparity between a “praiseworthy manner of comportment and one that is objectionable” (haidt, Embodying 1). Mariano is described as a lazy, late riser who spends his days gambling, rubbing shoulders with the scandalous Doña Mónica, and avoiding any acceptable notion of a work ethic. Iriarte seems to draw attention to the phallic nature of Mariano’s inadequate “bastoncito,” or else it would have been textually indistinguishable from that of Don Cristóbal, referenced below. Though a “bastón” might carry obvious practical connotations as a walking aid, the diminutive form seems to emphasize its accessorial, decorative and ornamental function in the arsenal of a  fashionable  dandy.  To  strengthen  this  analysis,  one  might  juxtapose  Mariano’s  “bastoncito”  with  Don  Cristóbal’s  “bastón,”  referenced  explicitly  in stage directions in act II: “Toma el sombrero, la espada y el bastón, que están sobre  una  silla”  (176).  The  frequent  references  to  Mariano’s  incomplete  or inadequate embodiment of suitable masculine virtues are constantly checked by  the  pervasive  presence  of  the  diminutive  suffix  – ito in  words  associated with or used to describe Mariano’s effeminacy or petiteness (señorito, caballerito, bastoncito), all of which recall the potential sodomitical undertones in his name (Mariano/marión). The open criticisms of other characters like Don Cristóbal, Don alfonso, and Don Fausto, all representatives of the collective and corrective hombría de bien, reinforce the role Mariano’s transvestism has in signaling his devious inner character. Mariano’s explicit identification with the petimetre, though, gives way to other indications in the play that further give form and contour to his desires 12 This portrait of Mariano also corresponds to a fashion plate analyzed by haidt (“Fashion” 65). a similar plate is reproduced in bozal’s edition of the colección general and depicts a bareheaded, and seated petimetre dressed in a morning suit (61).

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and  transgressions,  both  characteristically  and  sartorially.  his  friends  – not the aristocratic gentlemen with whom he should be associating – are identified as “amigotes que le enseñen / a gastar con todo garbo, / a frecuentar las insignes aulas de Cupido y baco, / cafees [sic], mesas de trucos, / nobles garitos,  fandangos  /  de  candil,  y  otras  tertulias  /  perfumadas  del  cigarro”  (vv. 321-328).  The  señorito’s  objectionable  attitude  and  desires  extend  beyond the  typical  characterization  of  the  aristocratic  petimetre,  while  maintaining certain hallmarks such as idleness and laziness. revealing his modus operandi, however, Mariano states: “La vida / es corta. Se pasa un rato / de paseo, otro  de  juego;  /  cuatro  amigos,  el  teatro,  /  algún  baile,  la  tertulia,  /  tal  cual partida de campo; / y uno gasta alegremente lo poco que Dios le ha dado,” continuing to reveal society’s definition of this comporment: “[o]ciosidad llaman esto / algunos críticos raros . . . / pero a los hombres de modo / nuncan [sic] los prenden por vagos” (vv. 860-870). Such an active lifestyle, according  to  Mariano,  can  hardly  be  interpreted  as  idleness.  Likewise,  instead  of showing off the luxury items he acquires (watches, a diamond ring for Doña Flora),  he  exchanges  or  sells  them  without  hesitation.  Doña  Dominga laments  her  son’s  constant  bartering  and  trading,  the  tokens  for  which  are expensive watches. The mother inquires, “¿Dónde has dejado / los relojes?” to which her son responds “Me los trueca / por otros un conocido, / y se los he  dado  a  prueba”  (vv.  1161-1164).  Watches  are  other  examples  of  coded vocabulary  associated  with  petimetres, who  commonly  used  them  to  please women  (haidt,  Embodying 138).  For  Mariano,  the  exchange  value  of  these luxury items exceeds their use value as tools to increase productivity and as “aids towards industriousness” (139). This carefree attitude or marcialidad is one  that  was  often  attacked  by  eighteenth-century  moralists:  “Se  trata  ante todo de una actitud de desafío de las jóvenes generaciones de las clases acomodadas frente a ciertas conveniencias de orden social o familiar tenidas por opresivas” (andioc 476). Writers like Iriarte and Jovellanos were critical of the  desire  to  appear  evasive  before  authority.  Mariano,  on  the  other  hand, demonstrates a legitimate lèse-majesté by the end of the play, for which he is forced  to  move  to  valencia  for  reeducation.  There  is  an  obvious  tension  at play between the desire to appear transgressive, and actually transgressing. Like Don Cristóbal, Don alfonso is similarly preoccupied by Mariano’s behavior and dress, especially given his daughter’s sentimental attachment to him,  and  the  proposed  marriage  of  the  two.  Informed  by  the  qué dirán of eighteenth-century Madrid, Don alfonso reports that a boy like Mariano who shifts so easily between the garments of a gentleman to those of a majo confirm his status as an idler and a vagrant (i.e. not a gentleman or hombre de bien).  In  the  eyes  of  societal  conventions,  embodied  here  by  Don alfonso,

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the  clothes  do  make  the  man:  “pasando  noches  enteras  /  fuera  de  casa, mudando / el traje de caballero / en capote jerezano [. . .] cobrando opinión / de  ocioso  y  desarreglado”  (vv.  653-658).  Don alfonso  equates  the  negative connotations associated with Mariano’s mutable wardrobe with other behaviors and personality traits listed by Don Cristóbal, such as his gambling and friendship with miscreants. Mariano’s majo-inspired wardrobe further marks him  as  a  deviant  subject,  with  suggestions  of  both  disorder  and  idleness. When el señorito disappears later in the play to partake in dubious business transactions with his friends, he enters the stage “vestido de majo y embozado  con  un  capote  a  la  jerezana”  (286). This  outfit,  linked  geographically  to andalucía,  allows  Mariano  to  sneak  away  easily  – as  it  has  throughout  the play – while also resulting in a moment of misidentification when he is later found guilty of playing the role of a banker in a fraud ring with his friends.13 When  Mariano  is  tried  for  his  crimes  – recounted  to  the  audience  indirectly by Don Cristóbal – it is revealed that his use of the majo outfit resulted in  the  initial  uncertainty  on  the  part  of  the  presiding  judge  in  recognizing Mariano’s  status  as  a  nobleman;  the  cloak  and  hat  of  the  majo became  the crucial  sartorial  signifiers  that  let  him  roam  and  transgress  freely.  however once  his  “true”  identity  as  a  nobleman  is  unveiled,  says  Don  Cristóbal,  the boy’s punishment is adjusted: “El juez le desconoció / por el traje; mas sabiendo  /  quién  era,  vino  a  decirme  /  que  la  multa  y  el  destierro,  /  de  que  no deben  librarse  /  los  viciosos  en  tal  juego,  /  habrán  de  comprender  /  a  este mozo  sin  remedio”  (vv.  3039-3046).  In  order  to  rewire  Mariano’s  deficient character, he is banished from the capital and its temptations, severed as well from  “las  faldas”  of  Doña  Dominga  and  the  corrupting  influence  of  his friends.  Don  Cristóbal  agrees  to  travel  with  him  to valencia,  where  he  will keep a watchful eye over his reeducation. The image of Don Cristóbal guiding the childish and docile Mariano into the “desierto” of valencia – perhaps still armed with his “bastón” – might humorously evoke hagiographic images of Saint Christopher carrying the young Christ, although here of course Iriarte’s antihero lacks any Christological symbolism. In El señorito mimado, along with other texts discussed above, there is a marked  tension  between  the  didactic  aims  of  enlightened  moralism  and  the possible  or  real  threat  of  class  transvestism.  Such  cross-dressing  effectively undermined disciplinary mechanisms, embodied in the comedy by both Don Cristóbal  and  the  juridical  apparatus  of  the  absolute  monarchy.  It  also 13 Men who covered themselves in large capes and hats, referred to as “embozados” in the “edicto  de  capas  y  sombreros”  (see  note  15)  were  the  source  of  several  of  goya’s  paintings, including his El paseo de andalucía, o La maja y los embozados (1777).

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indexed eighteenth-century anxieties regarding appropriate masculine behavior:  a  young  aristocratic  man  who  dressed  like  a  petimetre risked  being labeled as sexually deviant for his avoidance of the signposts of ideal forms of masculinity – his effeminacy and refusal to marry – whereas the aristocrat who  dons  the  enshrouding  ensemble  of  the  majo takes  part  in  undermining established  social  hierarchies  and  edicts  that  strove  to  ban  or  regulate  such comportment.  Though  Mariano’s  behavior  is  safely  corrected  during  the comedy’s didactic denouement, Iriarte does contribute to the increased visibility  granted  to  men  who  stretch  the  boundaries  and  limits  of  both  gender and class. Similar coding of clothing as indicative of transgressive desires occurs in Iriarte’s  La señorita malcriada, published  a  year  later  in  1788  but  not  performed  until  1791.  here  the  negative  effect  of  the  behaviors,  customs,  and dress of the majo on the eponymous señorita is also criticized in an attempt to rid the influence of the working classes on the impressionable aristocratic women  of  Madrid,  epitomized  by  Pepita.  Whereas  the  discourse  in  earlier texts take interest in attacking the “effeminate” behavior of the upper classes, the  discourse  expands  in  texts  like  Iriarte’s  El señorito mimado and  Jovellanos’s “Sátira segunda” to privilege critiques of the idle youth of the upper classes,  particularly  those  who  blur  the  distinctiveness  of  social  hierarchies and evade disciplinary mechanisms by way of class transvestism. In extracting the visible influence of popular, barriobajera culture in young aristocrats like  Mariano,  the  reader  or  spectator  of  Iriarte’s  moralizing  comedy  recognizes that young gentlemen should not only behave, but also dress according to their ostensibly prewritten stations in society. Indeed, clothes do make the man in Iriarte’s play, but the man in question joyfully subverts the strict binary categories of the normative universe he was destined to inhabit. UnIvErSITy oF vIrgInIa

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