The
Coronation (Le Couronnement)
by Fernando Arrabal —Summary
Fernando Arrabal’s The
Coronation unfolds in a strange and dreamlike world where ordinary
distinctions between life and death, love and cruelty, tenderness and violence
gradually disappear. The story centres on Giafar, a young man who is deeply in
love with Sylda.
One day, Giafar goes
to Sylda’s room and discovers her lying motionless on her bed. She appears to
be dead. Shocked and overwhelmed by grief, Giafar approaches her and kisses
her. In the strange world of the play, the kiss brings Sylda back to life. What
initially seems to be an act of love, however, quickly becomes the beginning of
a disturbing ordeal.
After Sylda awakens,
Giafar finds himself trapped and chained inside the room. He is no longer
simply the lover who has come to rescue the woman he loves. He becomes the
object of a series of humiliations, commands and cruel games. Sylda herself
participates in this treatment, shifting unpredictably between affection,
hostility and domination. The room becomes increasingly isolated from the
ordinary world, and Giafar is unable to understand whether what is happening is
real, imagined or part of some elaborate ritual.
Other figures
gradually enter this bizarre situation. Two men appear and take part in the
strange treatment of Giafar. They behave toward him with a mixture of
playfulness and cruelty, turning his suffering into a kind of entertainment.
Their actions have no clear practical purpose. They seem to follow rules known
only to themselves, and their behaviour continually changes between childish
amusement and frightening violence.
Sylda’s parents also
become involved. Instead of protecting Giafar or restoring order, they become
part of the strange series of encounters taking place around him. The family
atmosphere is therefore completely unlike an ordinary household. Affection, authority
and violence become mixed together, and Giafar remains caught within the
increasingly confusing situation.
A further
transformation occurs when a woman named Arlys appears. Giafar encounters her
as another figure in the unfolding drama, but the distinction between Arlys and
Sylda eventually becomes uncertain. Arlys is revealed to be Sylda in another
identity. The revelation deepens the confusion surrounding the characters,
because the woman whom Giafar loves can appear in different forms while still
remaining the same person.
Throughout the play,
Giafar continues to be subjected to strange ceremonies and cruel games.
Characters change roles, identities become unstable, and actions that would
normally have serious consequences are treated as if they were parts of a
child's game. Violence and affection repeatedly appear together. A gesture that
begins as loving may suddenly become threatening, while an act of cruelty may
be presented almost playfully.
Giafar's
relationship with Sylda therefore passes through repeated transformations. He
seeks love and companionship, but instead finds himself imprisoned, humiliated
and manipulated. Sylda, meanwhile, appears alternately as lover, victim,
tormentor and disguised stranger. The people around them contribute to the
confusion rather than resolving it.
As the strange
events continue, the play moves further away from a conventional story with a
clear sequence of realistic events. The characters seem to participate in a
ceremonial world governed by its own mysterious rules. Repetition, disguises,
physical restraints, sudden changes and disturbing games dominate the action.
Giafar remains at the centre of these experiences, continually trying to
understand the identity and intentions of those around him.
The title The
Coronation becomes associated with this atmosphere of ritual and ceremony.
What might ordinarily suggest celebration, honour and the beginning of a new
order is transformed into something grotesque and disturbing. The characters
participate in events that resemble a ceremony, but the ceremony is repeatedly
contaminated by cruelty, humiliation and death-like imagery.
By the end, the
boundaries separating the different characters and their identities have become
almost impossible to maintain. Sylda and Arlys, lover and tormentor, victim and
aggressor, reality and illusion seem to merge into one another. Giafar's experience
has taken him through a succession of bizarre encounters in which nothing
remains stable for long.
The play concludes
not with a conventional resolution but with the continuation of its strange
ceremonial world. The characters remain caught within a cycle of love, cruelty,
transformation and ritual, leaving Giafar's experience suspended between dream and
nightmare. The coronation is therefore presented as a bizarre theatrical
event in which the expected order of life has been replaced by an unpredictable
and unsettling game.
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