Repeating Islands

One of Alejandro Tapia y Rivera’s dramatic masterpieces, La Cuarerona [The Quarteroon], will be once again brought to the stage by the of the Puerto Rican Athenaeum theatre company. It will premiere on Friday, January 29, 2010, at the Teatro del Ateneo Puertorriqueño [The Puerto Rican Athenaeum Theatre] and will run until February 7 with shows on Fridays and Saturdays at 8:30pm and Sundays at 4:00pm.      

Published in Spain in 1867 and censured in Puerto Rico until 1878, it tells the tragic story of the ill-fated love between Julia, a young light-skinned mulatta, and her white lover, Count Carlos. The play’s initial poor reception is due to its abolitionist perspective and critique of the bourgeois landowning society that had made its fortune with the sweat of the slaves. In the vein of other nineteenth century texts with anti-slavery standpoints such as Cecilia Valdés (Cuba, 1839), Uncle Tom´s Cabin (United States, 1852), and Isaura, the Slave-girl (Brazil, 1875), this play explores racial segregation, class conflicts, and their political context.

This theatrical production is adapted and directed by Roberto Ramos-Perea (educator, playwright, actor, director, and theater critic), who has restored the work to its original form by reincorporating the bolder, more revolutionary portions of the text that had been censored by Spanish government and by Tapia y Rivera, and which do not appear in the versions in print today.  This piece offers an insightful analysis of the complex intersections of race, gender, and class within the colonial framework, making it compatible and current for on-going discussions on colonial and postcolonial relations today.

For more information, you may call (787) 977-2307 or see http://www.archivonacionaldeteatroycineap.com/