From Elsinore to Mexico City: the Pervasiveness of Shakespeare's Hamlet in Xavier Villaurrutia's Invitación a La Muerte

When Latin-American drama professor Frank Dauster brought Mexican poet and playwright Xavier Villaurrutia (1903-1950) to the attention of the English-reading public in 1971, more than two decades had passed since Villaurrutia's death. Known to a Spanish-speaking audience as a poet concerned with death, Villaurrutia wrote both poetry and drama. However, his first full-length play, INVITACIÓN A LA MUERTE, in 1947 marked the height of his dramatic career. The effort to connect the play to William Shakespeare's HAMLET brings Villaurrutia's work into a curious relationship with the famous tragedy. As this book reveals, Villaurrutia's reliance on Shakespeare permits him to dramatize the anguish affecting humankind in the twentieth century. This agony is at the center of Alberto's discomfort, intensified by the elements around which a modern-day Gertrude, Ophelia, Claudius, Horatio, and Polonius must grapple. When we confront Alberto, we see into the heart of the modern dilemma, a struggle not far from Shakespeare's Elsinore.