Melibea: eje de la scriptum ligata de La Celestina

Abstract

Through tiis investigation, Melibea's character is studied from a perspective that, beyond the textual content, privileges the formal structure of Fernando de Rojas' Tragicomedia de Calisto y Melibea through the profound system of symbols, and the principal metaphors of the text originally proposed by Alan Deyermond: the yarn, the girdle, and the chain. Also, the relation of this actant is examined with serpentine imagery and with chaos, the same chaos from which the author departs in the Prologue, to compare her importance in the weave of the text with that of the figure of the procuress, Celestina. Thus, Melibea is identified as the legitimate protagonist of the work, and as the axis of the text's warp itself.