Doña Rosita the Spinster, or The Language of the Flowers

(Doña Rosita la soltera, o El lenguaje de las flores) (1935)

Federico García Lorca

Drama evoking fin-de-siècle bourgeois society. During the years from 1890 to 1910, Rosita, awaiting her fiancé's return from Argentina, is transformed from a vigorous young girl into a faded, melancholy spinster. Her metamorphosis is identified with the life cycle of a rare rose grown by her horticulturist uncle, which blossoms a vivid red, pales as it wilts, and turns completely white at death. While Rosita waits and waits, spending her days in a mood of gentle self-pity, her earthy peasant housemaid seethes with frustrated rage and her friends marry and have children. Rosita's fiancé remains in Argentina and marries, although he continues to write her untruthful letters that promise his return.

After Rosita's uncle dies, her aunt is reduced to poverty because of a mortgage obtained years before in order to provide the girl with wedding presents. When Rosita learns of the suffering she has caused her aunt, she confesses that she has known for years about her fiancé's marriage. Unwilling to burden others, she has preferred to keep her frustration and disappointment to herself, resigned to fade as the wilting rose.