Nahuatl Theater, Volume 3 presents for the first time in English the complete dramatic works of Alva, the only known plays from Spain’s Golden Age adapted into the lively world of Nahuatl-language theater. Alva’s translations—“The Great Theater of the World,” “The Animal Prophet and the Fortunate Patricide,” “The Mother of the Best,” and a farcical intermezzo—represent ambitious attempts to add complex, Baroque dramatic pieces by such literary giants as Lope de Vega and Pedro CalderÓn de la Barca to the repertory of Nahuatl theater, otherwise dominated by sober one-act religious plays grounded in medieval tradition. The Spanish sources and Alva’s Nahuatl, set on facing pages with their English translations, show how Alva “Mexicanized” the plays by incorporating Nahuatl linguistic conventions and referencing local symbolism and social life. In their introductory essays, the editors offer contextual and interpretive information that provides an entrÉe into this rich material.

As the only known adaptations of these theatrical works into a Native American language, these plays stand as fine literature in their own right.

Louise M. Burkhart is Professor of Anthropology at the State University of New York, Albany, and co-editor and co-translator of Nahuatl Theater, the four-volume set of plays.

John F. Schwaller is Professor of History at the University at Albany (SUNY) and serves as the Latin American editor for the journal Ethnohistory. He is contributor to The Directory for Confessors, 1585: Implementing the Catholic Reformation in New Spain.