Blood Wedding, a Spanish rural tragedy, was written by Federico Garcia Lorca in 1932 while he was director of the travelling theater company Teatro Universitario La Barraca. The play was first performed at Teatro Beatriz in Madrid in 1933 under the title Bodas de Sangre. It ran briefly in America on Broadway in 1935, where it was retitled Bitter Oleander. It was not well received; the passions and folkloric culture in the play were too much for the actors and audiences. However, the play enjoyed success in its native Spain, and since then dozens of adaptations, films, and translations have followed, securing the play’s place as one of the pillars of twentieth-century theatre. Lorca’s reputation has only grown since his murder at the hands of Franco’s Nationalist party in 1936. He is now regarded as a luminary of Spanish letters, and is widely considered to be one of Spain’s finest poets and playwrights.

Lorca based the events of the play on “the Crime of Nijar,” an infamous honor killing that occurred in 1928 in the province of Almeria. In an honor killing, a woman, thought to have brought shame on her family, is murdered. In the Crime of Nijar, a young bride ran away with her cousin, who was also her young lover, on the day of her arranged wedding. The brother of the groom, who was married to the bride’s sister, pursued the lovers and killed the young man, while his wife strangled her sister, each in an attempt to restore honor to their families. Lorca brooded over these events for four years, then in the space of a week in 1932, wrote Blood Wedding in its entirety. Following the tradition of Attic Greek tragedy—a form of Greek tragedy performed in Athens in the 5th century B.C.— Lorca focused on themes which ran through his art: The Incompatibility of Desire and the Social Order, Women as Casualties in a heavily patriarchal society, the rites and oppressions which tie together rural communities, and, most importantly, the vibrancy of the duende as it rises out of the Spanish soil.

An article by the American Conservatory theater discusses duende in relation to Lorca’s work. In Spanish, duende translates to “ghost or goblin.” It is also linked to inspiration, “a spirit that enters the body of the artist when they are performing, writing, and/or painting.” Lorca himself had discussed duende: It is “‘a force, not a labor, a struggle, not a thought,’ ‘the mystery, the roots that cling to the mire we all know,’ and ‘a creature who sweep[s] the earth with its wings of rusty knives.’ It is not based in reason or the intellect, it ‘surges up from the soles of the feet.’” (A.C.T. Publications Staff. “Evocation, Inspiration, and Ignition—A.C.T.’s Blood Wedding Brings the Spirit of Duende to Life.” 2020. blog.act-sf.org.)

Lorca’s duende is a power which arises in the artist and the audience. It evokes the primal sense of the universe, one rooted in pain and mystery. Lorca sought to explore the source of the duende in his work by exploring the lives of agrarian peoples who lived in ancient ways, close to the earth. His method included four aspects he considered vital to the duende: irrationality (or surrealism), earthiness, a heightened awareness of death, and a latent maliciousness. In Lorca’s rural tragedy, these elements combine to evoke a spirit of tempestuous passion.

This guide refers to 1997 translation by Ted Hughes, published by Farrar, Straus, and Giroux.

Plot Summary

In a remote part of rural Andalusia, a young man, the Bridegroom, prepares to marry after purchasing a fertile vineyard and securing his financial future. His Mother is distrustful of the Bride he has chosen; she has learned that the Bride had a youthful romance with Leonardo Felix, a member of the clan who killed the Bridegroom’s father and brother in a long-standing blood feud. In favor of her son’s happiness, the Mother stays silent.

Leonardo has been visiting the Bride at night, riding his horse to exhaustion. His Wife, the Bride’s cousin, has learned this from her neighbors. She confronts him, and he lies to her. When he finds out that the Bride and Bridegroom are soon to be engaged he grows cruel to his Wife, her mother, and a visitor. It is obvious Leonardo does not love his Wife.

At the isolated farm where the Bride lives with her Father, the Mother and the Bridegroom negotiate the terms of the marriage with the Father, who is eager to acquire more land. Once the details of the wedding have been decided, the Bride appears, but she is sullen and unenthusiastic. When she is left alone with her Servant, the Bride refuses to look at presents she was given. The Servant says she saw Leonardo at the Bride’s window the previous night, and the Bride lies about seeing him. They hear a horse running into the night; the Servant dashes to the window. Leonardo was listening to all they said.

The morning of the wedding, a disinterested Bride prepares. Leonardo races ahead of the other guests so he might speak to the Bride alone. He suggests the Bridegroom is unsuitable for the Bride, but the Bride is enraged and denounces him. They passionately quarrel over their past, when the Bride refused to marry him because he could not financially support her and her Father’s ambitions. Leonardo then married the Bride’s cousin. He admits that an agitated passion still burns inside him for the Bride, and that he needed to tell her this before her wedding. The Bride’s resolve crumbles; she admits she cannot resist Leonardo’s voice. Her Servant intervenes, sending Leonardo away. When the Bridegroom, his Mother, and the rest of the wedding guests arrive, the Bride rushes them into the ceremony. She desperately hopes that marriage will allow her to forget her feelings.

After the wedding ceremony, the Mother and the Father return to the farm amidst the large party and discuss their hopes for the future now that their families are joined. The wedded couple return. The Bride leaves to change into another dress, and the Bridegroom happily discourses with the guests. The young attendants to the Bride express excitement for her. She is sullen again, and promises they won’t be excited for their weddings. Despite the festivities, she retires to her room. When her presence is required for the ritual dances, it is discovered that she and Leonardo are missing. The Bridegroom and his Mother realize they have eloped. They stir up a posse and pursue the lovers.

In a primordial forested landscape, two natural forces, the Moon and Death, have become personified, assume sentient, human roles. The Moon and Death lead the pursuit after the lovers.

The Bride begs Leonardo to kill her, believing this the only way to restore her honor. Leonardo refuses, declaring that he loves her too much, though his love has caused him extreme pain and grief. The Bride admits that she feels the same way—Leonardo is the only one who can quench her desire. They agree that they cannot live without each other, and resolve to escape or die together. The personification of Death, who was leading an enraged Bridegroom to the couple, appears on stage. With two choked-off screams, it is implied that Leonardo and the Bridegroom have killed one another.

The shrouded bodies are brought back to the community, followed by a blood-spattered Bride. Leonardo’s mother-in-law advises her daughter to wear a veil, isolate herself with her children, and prepare to live a life alone in mourning. The Bridegroom’s Mother angrily shushes the crying of her neighbor. She says that her own grief will be private. When the Bride arrives, begging to be killed, the Mother strikes her, but refrains from a second blow. She realizes that the Bride isn’t at fault, that the torrents of passion are too much for any one person. She allows the Bride to remain in her doorway, sobbing. The bodies pass.