Euripides and his Tragedy Hecuba transfigured into Polixena y la cocinerita (1931), a "pyrotechnic farse" by Alfonsina Storni

Abstract

This article analyzes the poetics of the play Polixena y la cocinerita (1931), by Alfonsina Storni. It proposes to study how the author appropriates the tragedy Hecuba, by Euripides, through rewriting operations, and how she turns the famous playwright into a character. Polixena y la cocinerita is a relevant case of the theatrical modernization of Argentina in the 1930s. This modernization concerns, on one hand, formal aspects of the dramatic structure, and on the other, the semantic and thematic dimension of its representation of women as "modern slaves". While declaring fascination for men, the text denounces the apology of masculine values, sexism, classism and gender violence, which leads "the little cook" to suicide. It denounces the suffering of workers in a society of inequality. It also marks a politics of difference with respect to the past: it puts on the scene new roles for the "adventurous" woman, who seeks to "go out into the world" and establish herself in a (self) observation laboratory of social reality to produce knowledge and generate transformations. New roles that, along with discoveries and affirmations, reveal resistances, oppositions and difficulties in the project of building a new space for women in contemporary times.