Chapter Four - Turning the Tables on Men in Exemplary Tales of Love

Summary

In her “To the Reader,” Zayas names the primary challenge she faced in publishing her novellas: simply to be taken seriously as a woman writer. Her “audacity” in doing so, she asserts, ought to be attributed to “virtuous daring” rather than madness. Another challenge was that of defending women vigorously without alienating male readers, who made up far and away the largest body of the literate public in her day. Zayas qualifies as fools those who think women are incapable, adding that “anyone … [who is] no less than a good courtier, will neither find it a novelty nor gossip about it as idiocy” [Pero cualquiera, como sea no más de buen cortesano, ni lo tendrá por novedad ni lo murmurará por desatino]. In concluding the preface, she amplifies her demand for masculine courtesy:

There is no rivalry with women; the one who fails to esteem them is a fool, because he needs them, and the one who insults them is an ingrate, for he lacks the respect due the hospitality that women gave men in their first journey. And so, then, you must not wish to be discourteous, idiotic, base, or ungrateful. I offer you this book very sure of your gallantry and confident that, should it displease you, you will be able to pardon me because I was born a woman, not with obligations to write good novellas but with a great desire to succeed in serving you. Farewell.

[Con mujeres no hay competencias: quien no las estima es necio, … con muchos deseos de acertar a servirte. Vale.]

I imagine Zayas standing tall to deliver this straightforward demand, reminding men that they are all born of women and are obliged both by human biology and by codes of gentlemanly conduct to respect them. And then softening her sermon with a graceful closing curtsey to her audience.

In her first volume, the Novelas, Zayas performs a balancing act, alternating fictional lessons and exhortations to women with others to men. She does so by switching between female and male narrators, having some of them preface their tales with warnings to members of their own gender. In N. 2, “Everything Ventured,” Matilde, the narrator, introduces her tale saying she will follow Lisarda's example in ETL 1.