Felipe Ángeles: la reivindicación de la soberanía del Yo

• Main Author: Ute Seydel
• Format: Article
• Language: Spanish
• Published: Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México 2010-10-01
• Series: Literatura Mexicana
• Subjects: elena garro; felipe ángeles; george bataille; política / ética; soberanía del yo
• Online Access: https://revistas-filologicas.unam.mx/literatura-mexicana/index.php/lm/article/view/652

The drama Felipe Ángeles is analyzed in accord with George Bataille’s approach, who affirmed that by means of sacrifice, human beings have destroyed their natural or animal being, in order to be, and to reveal, their non-corporal, spiritual truth. In the theatrical work of Elena Garro, the judgement of the Villista general is not only characterized as a sacrificial ritual but also as a spectacle and farce. While the adversaries of Felipe Ángeles propose to give a legal appearance to the elimination of a political adversary, the general converts the trial into a public action which permits him to portray himself, by means of his discourse before the tribunal, as a martyr who accepts being sacrificed for his political ideas, his ideals, and his ethical values. He revindicates in this way the sovereignty of his pure I and his interior liberty; and at the same time, that makes possible the transcendence of his death and the persistence of his spiritual being.