POBREZA NO ES VILEZA DE LOPE DE VEGA REFUNDIDA: LA VERSIÓN ROMÁNTICA DE VALLADARES Y SAAVEDRA

This article examines the Romantic rewriting of Lope de Vega’s Pobreza no es vileza, produced in mid-nineteenth century by Ramón de Valladares y Saavedra. Drawing on the Advertencia that precedes Valladares’s version, the study explores the aesthetic and practical principles guiding his adaptation, within a theatrical context influenced by late Neoclassicism and the emerging Romantic sensibility. The analysis focuses on the tension between fidelity to the Golden Age model and the need to adjust it to nineteenth-century stage conventions and audience expectations. Special attention is given to the structural simplification of the plot, the heightened emotional intensity, and the transformation of the protagonist, Mendoza, into a tragic, psychologically tormented hero. The aim is to demonstrate that Valladares’s rewriting is a key example of how Spanish Romanticism sought to modernize and reinterpret the classical heritage of the Siglo de Oro, bringing tradition and innovation in the nineteenth-century stage.