Blood Wedding - Federico Garcia Lorca

A tale of lust, love and betrayal, Lorca’s ‘Blood Wedding’ is one of the most gripping and exciting plays I have read. I often don’t like reading plays as I find that their vivid meanings can not be fully explained in the short paraphrased stage directions, however I couldn’t put Blood Wedding down. I must say now that this next part of the review contains some spoilers, although I knew what was going to happen before I read it and still found it brilliant and shocking. Lorca himself grew up in rural Spain, and this upbringing can clearly be seen to influence his later work, especially in ... more

As the title suggests, this is a play steeped in blood, passion, and death - written by one of the most poetic playwrights of the Twentieth Century. Federico Garcia Lorca is probably Spain’s most celebrated dramatist, and I have always felt that ‘Blood Wedding’ is his finest play. The story is not a complex one – in fact it is almost archetypal in its simplicity: on her wedding night, a young bride elopes with her lover, Leonardo. The couple are pursued by the humiliated bridegroom and a knife duel takes place between him and Leonardo in which both are killed. The ... more

Picture this, it’s a warm summer night in the heart of the Spanish countryside, there is laughter and great excitement emanating from a small opening in a doorway leading to an expansive great hall where a banquet is taking place in your honour, for it is your wedding night. And where are you at this time? Quite simply you are slipping away into the shadows with your true love to pursue an illicit affair, hoping never to be seen again. All that remains is the sweet aroma of Orange Blossom. This play is about a love triangle and blood feud between two Spanish families in the heart of the ... more

Federico Garcia Lorca's homosexuality led him to a place of solitude where he developed a particularly poetic quality of observation. 'Blood Wedding' highlights his genius, perhaps more than any of his other works. It is a story of lust, love, jealously and anger. It reveals what can happen when we allow pride to go unchecked. Perhaps, most importantly, it draws our attention to the cesspit of hypocricy that broods under the surface of so-called 'respectable society'. Lorca was interested in revolutionising the Spanish stage. He had grown tired of the 'realism' with which it was beset. He ... more

Blood wedding, is fantastic as an A level piece of performance for any teachers out there. The students quickly get to love it as it has so much sex and death in it and they find the poetry and lyricism of the piece with ease. Our approach for unit 5 owed much to The Godfather film and we transported the action to Sicilly. The father became the Mafia Don and it all flowed very easily from there, with ring kissing and allegiances owed to the ruling family of the bride. For those who want to know about the story it is a dark passion filled scenario, thoroughly rooted in a tradition bound spanish ... more