<i>EL Guzmán de Alfarache</i> : Prólogo, narratología y confesiones de Mateo Alemán frente a la Inquisición

Abstract

The subject of this short essay will be the multiple prologue of the Guzmán de Alfarache I (1599) by Mateo Alemán, dedicated to don Francisco de Rojas, to the vulgo and to the author‘s discreto lector (discreet reader). We will use the theory of Jorge Luis Borges, which can be found in his book Prólogos con prólogo de prólogos about the prologue as an entity, a sui generis work of art that does no limit itself to a simple introduction or an editorial convention. To perform this work, we will do what I called a close-reading of the prologue, making sure to adjust our reader‘s lens to gain access to the secrets of this text. To do that, we will study the inquisitorial context of the time, the circumstances of the author and his relation with his public in order to access the hidden messages of the text. Our proposal is that the multiple prologues constitute a confession that-with the help of the close-reading - we may be able to decode.