Cervantes's Democratization of Demonic Possession: El rufián dichoso , Blasco de Lanuza, and the Death-Bed of Every Christian

Abstract

The treatment of exorcism in El rufián dichoso is an aspect of the play that is often ignored by Cervantes critics. In addition to demonstrating and analyzing the presence of clearly exorcistic elements in the text, and contextualizing them in light of similar cases of exorcism in historical documents of the same period, I study comparatively the text of Cervantes's comedia de santos and El patrocinio de ángeles y combate de demonios (1652), written by Francisco Blasco de Lanuza. El patrocinio de ángeles is a book of exorcisms that includes several significant chapters on the ars moriendi , where death appears represented as the final battle against the temptation of demons. Given that Cervantes and Blasco de Lanuza both "democratize" the experience of demonic possession by bringing it home to the deathbed of every Christian, I propose that the death of Ana in El rufián dichoso could serve as an example or model of the ideal death as Blasco de Lanuza imagines it in his treatise.