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191

Shortened Title

SARAH FINLEY

Embodied Sound and Female Voice in

Sor Juana Ins de la Cruzs Canon:
romance 8 and El divino Narciso
This essay examines embodied sound as locus of female agency in Sor Juana
Ins de la Cruzs reimaginings of Echo and Narcissus in romance 8 and El
divino Narciso. I argue that these pieces draw upon the interstices of seeing
and hearing as well as voices physical and pathetic effects in order to refigure
womens aurality as counterpoint to patriarchal visuality. Debates in acoustics,
musica pathetica and the music of the spheres resonate in both works and lend
insight into Sor Juanas engagement with early modern sound culture. Vestiges of
Athanasius Kirchers encyclopedic musical treatisesMusurgia universalis
(1650) and Phonurgia nova (1673)are especially salient, and his influence
upon sonority in Sor Juanas poetic imagination appears greater than previously
thought. Broadly, I draw out themes of musical and non-musical sound that
previous readings marginalized in order to generate further conversation about
aurality in Sor Juanas canon.

Introduction
References to sound and music in Sor Juana Ins de la Cruzs
(1648/51-95) canon have long intrigued readers, for they offer insight
into the nuns sound world and evidence for her engagement with Western music culture. Poems like romance 21 and loa 384 (Encomistico
poema) comment on early modern music theory, while figured sound
and silences in Primero sueo and the Respuesta a Sor Filotea exceed
logos and its complement, reasonperhaps channeling mysticisms
orality.1 Despite these advances, disciplinary boundaries continue to
separate sound and music from areas like literature, philosophy and science.2 As a result, there are many unexplored resonances in Sor Juanas
acoustico-poetic production. One area that has received little attention
Revista de Estudios Hispnicos 50 (2016)

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Sarah Finley

is the striking intersection of sight and sound. Indeed, aural irruptions

pepper visuality all throughout the nuns oeuvre, and frequent eye/ear
chiasmi like in lira 211 yeme con los ojos / ya que estn distantes
los odos (1.78) explore connections between the two modes. This
apparent intersection of seeing and hearing challenges notions of ocularcentrism and beckons further examination.
Prior scholarship offers a preliminary response to such concerns.
To begin, Octavio Paz and Frederick Luciani laid groundwork for rereading aural/visual links in Sor Juanas oeuvre by highlighting one
possible source: Athanasius Kirchers geometrical acoustics, theories of
sound propagation based upon principles of ray optics (Paz 317; Luciani 127).3 Their comments are compelling but brief, and Sor Juanas
engagement with Kirchers work on light and sound merits additional
attention. From another perspective, Emilie Bergmann responded to
Sor Juanas alignment of seeing and hearing with a reading of how the
famed long poem Primero sueo brings visual models of knowing into
dialogue within the poems inscription of sound (142). Her interpretation meaningfully attended to the relationship between ear and eye in
Primero sueo by relating visual references in the poem to its linguistic
sonority. Even so, ample intersections of sight and sound elsewhere in
the nuns oeuvre offer opportunities to deepen understanding of this
relationship.
Additional concerns also become pertinent to Sor Juanas juxtaposition of sight and sound. For instance, visuality is often linked to
patriarchal themes like reason and intellect while aurality seems to offer
a feminine alternative to such motifs. Regarding these gendered takes
on sound, Josefina Ludmer remarked that silence in the Respuesta a Sor
Filotea reflects the nuns position of subordination (88), and Stephanie
Merrim observed similar themes in Ecos loss of voice in the allegorical
play El divino Narciso (Mores Geometricae 11415). Despite the persuasiveness of such arguments, I maintain that the nuns sensitivity to
womens voice exceeds metaphorical or biographical interpretations by
channeling scientific and philosophical discourses in aurality.
Female voices are linked to agency throughout Sor Juanas
oeuvre. For instance, villancico 220 complements womens aurality in
romance 8 and El divino Narciso by connecting the Virgin Marys song
with reason:
En estas especies musicales
tiene tanta inteligencia,

Embodied Sound and Female Voice in Sor Juana Ins de la Cruzs Canon

193

que el contrapunto de Dios

dio en ella la ms Perfecta. (2.2427)

Here, celestial harmony resonates with Marys voice and feminine

intellectthat is, womens inheritance of the scholarly legacy that Sor
Juana attributed to St. Catherine of Alexandria, Isis and the Virgin as
theologian, among others. The alignment of song and knowledge illustrates Sor Juanas refiguring of aurality in light of her concerns about
gender. Indeed, by likening Marys scholarly aptitude to her musical
skills, the nun legitimizes womens intellectual activity despite the manner in which it challenged ideals of feminine piety. As Colleen Baade
observed in her study of music in early modern Spanish convents, while
some cloistered women and religious thinkers viewed nuns musical
performances as obstacles to exemplary humility, others interpreted
them as enlightening displays of divine harmony (9093). Villancico
220 exploits these conflicting discourses of piety, for linking Marys
intellect to song and the music of the spheres suggests that displays
of feminine eruditionlike skilled music-makingcould become
instruments of spiritual edification. Consequently, a dialectics of gender
and piety overlaps with reason and sound and beckons a re-reading of
female voice in Sor Juanas canon.
With all this in mind, I seek to put prior remarks about Sor
Juanas aurality into dialogue and contextualize them further by attending to the poets gendered auditory poetics. My argument is that links
between eye and ear drawn from geometrical acoustics, sensory perception and affect theory all inform Sor Juanas re-imagining of sound as an
alternative, feminine space. The Ovidian archetypes Narcissus and Echo
prove especially useful for drawing out refigured paradigms of gender
and sound. As we shall see, connections among aurality, womens expression and agency inform Sor Juanas reimaginings of Echo in romance
8 and El divino Narciso. These works develop auditory responses to
visual topics like the vulnus caecumthe blind or secret wound that
causes lovesickness and is generally associated with vision (Wells 72).
Furthermore, El divino Narciso and romance 8 also conflate gender via
powerful representations of womens song that blur the roles of Echo/
Narcissus and Siren/Ulysses. The repercussions of a Sound Studies approach are broadly relevant for Sor Juanas canon, and my conclusions
lay groundwork for re-reading sound in other works that engage aurality, including: Primero sueo, loa 384 or villancico 220.

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Sarah Finley

Auditory paradigms also become useful for tracing Sor Juanas

intellectual inheritance. As Paz, Luciani and Trabulse have suggested,
Kirchers encyclopedic treatise on sound Musurgia universalis (1650)
and the abbreviated revision Phonurgia nova (1673) are essential to
understanding Sor Juanas aurality. Therefore, a secondary goal of this
essay is to sharpen Kircherian resonances in the poets oeuvre. Notably,
Kirchers theories of geometrical acoustics along with his ideas about
hearing and musical pathos persist in the nuns reimaginings of Narcissus and Echo and elsewhere in her canon.4 For example, in romance 8,
a feminized Narcisa falls in love with her voice instead of her reflection.
Sound and light thus become interchangeable. A precise description of
the trajectory and reverberation of Narcisas song heightens the poems
aurality by substituting phonos for the personified Echo and also recalls
an acoustical diagram from Phonurgia nova.
Geometric Acoustics and the Aural vulnus caecum
Let us begin by exploring a sorjuanine trope in which Kirchers
geometric acoustics resonates: Sor Juanas re-imagining of earinstead
of eyeas origin of the wound of love. Visual metaphors of attraction
and connections between sight and Cupids arrow were common in medieval and early modern cultural production. Antiquity constructions of
vision as a link between subject and object informed the development
of this topic, and ocular themes like fantasy, contagion and (visual)
penetration persisted in later imaginings. Marion Wellss term for loves
blind or secret wound particularly illustrates underlying themes of
vision, and I borrow it here to refer to Sor Juanas auditory refiguring:
her aural vulnus caecum (72).
The vulnus caecum intersects with themes like desire, courtly
love and lovesickness. Marsilio Ficinos De amore (1484) transmitted the
concept to early modern culture in a re-reading of Eross violent physical and psychological effects in Lucretiuss De rerum natura (first century BC): Lucretius can only mean that the blood of a man wounded
by a ray of the eyes flows forward into the wounder, just as the blood
of a man slain with a sword flows onto the slayer (qtd. in Wells 163).
In the Ficinian imagining, theories of intromissionwhereby visually
sensible objects emit species or likenesses of themselves that stamp their
image upon the viewers eye and penetrate itguide the wound of love

Embodied Sound and Female Voice in Sor Juana Ins de la Cruzs Canon

195

and link it to light rays that shoot from the love object and make him/
her visible.
In contrast, Sor Juanas aural vulnus caecum draws upon geometric acoustics and responds to Ficinos ocularcentrism by replacing
light with sound as amorous weapon. The best example can be found
in romance 8, which links hearing and desire through re-workings of
Narcissus (sight or Eye) and Echo (sound or Ear). At the heart of Sor
Juanas poem, a fundamental question challenges Ficinian visuality: if
the same geometric principles guide light and sound reflection (respectively, catroptics and anacamptics), how does voice compare to eye as an
amorous weapon? For Sor Juana, the answer appears to lie in Kirchers
musical and acoustical theories.
The opening lines of romance 8 establish paradigms of Sor
Juanas aural vulnus caecum. Indeed, connections between Narcisas voice
and the wound of love become evident in the very first verse:
Hiri blandamente el aire
con su dulce voz Narcisa,
y l le repiti los ecos
por bocas de las heridas. (1.14)

Here, Voices sweetness contrasts with the damaging impact of Narcisas

song. The laments brutal effects recall the erotic violence that characterized the wound of love in De rerum natura and De amore. Furthermore,
these lines highlight the physicality of both song (sound) and romantic
attraction. Such focus on bodily and material themes seems at odds
with the courtly traditions idealization of chaste, neoplatonic love. Possible sources of acoustical and erotic materiality in romance 8 include
medico-literary discourses of lovesickness inherited from Antiquitya
tradition to which Wells refers as amor hereosand Kirchers ideas
about musical pathos. As we shall see, drawing out resonances of these
traditions can complement Sor Juanas well-documented engagement
with courtly love and contextualize links among body, mind, sound and
the passions in romance 8 and elsewhere in her canon.
It thus becomes useful to explore further the concept of lovesickness that resonates in Sor Juanas aural vulnus caecum. Lovesickness
or amor hereos generally refers to psychic and physical effects the lover
suffers when the bodys overheated spirits cause the beloveds phantasm
(a mental image that facilitates perception and cognition, according to
Aristotelian theories) to dominate judgment and develop as obsession.

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Symptoms might include: listlessness, sighing, loss of appetite and

general lack of interest in the outside world. Left untreated, the most
severe cases could lead to the death of a patient who wasted away from
love. To avoid such excessive fixation upon a love object, medical and
literary sources prescribed a variety of treatments, from soothing music
and baths to therapeutic intercourse.
Early modern culture inherited ideas about lovesickness from
ancient medical and literary authorities, and Muslim physicians filtered
these ideas to the West during the late medieval period. Mary F. Wack
has noted that Hippocratic medicine and Ovidian love poetry are key
discourses in the early development of this theme. Galens diagnostic
approach to unfulfilled desires damaging effects drew Eros into debates
on humoral medicine. Meanwhile, Ovids recommendations in Remedia
Amoris popularized remedies for such symptoms and thus became a
locus for interchange between medical and literary views of love (Wack
15). Following Hellenic and Roman explorations of loves psychosomatic effects, Rhazes and other Muslim medical scholars systematized Galens accounts during the ninth century and recognized lovesickness as
an authentic disease for the first time. Just over two hundred years later,
Constantines translation of Ibn al-Jazzars Viaticuma compendium of
Islamic medicinefiltered pathological interpretations of lovesickness
to Europe via prominent medical centers like the School of Salerno and
the University of Paris. Arnald of Villanova, Dino del Garbo, Peter of
Spain and others syncretized inherited medical and literary accounts of
lovesickness with the Judeo-Christian worldview.
As a result of these transformations, vestiges of amor hereos become apparent in courtly discourses. Wells sharpened understanding of
this inheritance by drawing out the two themes complementary nature
while noting that perceived distinctions between lovesickness as medical anomaly and courtly love as cultural hegemony channel mind/body
dualism: [t]he true counterdiscourse to Platonic eros is thus not the
sexualized love of the troubadours, but the medical discourse of love in
which the tense dialectic between body and soul unmasks a problematic
tension within Platonism itself (9). From this perspective, amor hereos
focused on adverse physiopsychological effects of unnatural romantic
attachment while fin amour celebrated chaste love of beauty as one step
in understanding Gods love and discouraged the fascination with an
individual that purportedly led to lovesickness.

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197

Sight and visual beauty were thus important concepts for lovesickness and desire in general. As Shadi Bartsch reminds us, in Antiquity it was a small step from ocular species physical contact with the
eye and an eroticized notion of vision (67). Indeed, love and erotic
obsession commonly originated with the vulnus caecum: the beloveds
beauty wounding the lovers eye. Vestiges of ancient optics corporeality along with visions links to fascination, memory, sacred and secular
devotion, possession and even immoral sensuality all resonated within
early versions of love at first sight.5
In romance 8, Narcisas harmonious song replaces visual beauty
as the wound of loves sensual dart, and Kirchers theories of geometric
acoustics offer a foundation for drawing aural themes into the ocular
conceit. Whereas the poems first verse establishes auditory motifs, a
description of the weapon/voices path in the second evokes the aural
vulnus caecum: De los Celestiales Ejes / el rpido curso fija (1.56).
Here, the repercussive trajectory of Narcisas song recalls an anacamptic
diagram from Phonurgia nova (Figure 1).6 Found at the opening of the
volumes first book Phonosophia anacamptica, the phonic triangle
illustration describes echoic pathways of sonic events. Sounda
straight line between source (A) and various receiving pointsreflects
or echoes according to principles of Euclidean geometry. Read through
this lens, Ejes (1.5) and curso (1.6) invoke the geometric contours
of Narcisas echo and recall Kirchers anacamptic theories.

Figure 1. Anacamptic triangle; Phonurgia Nova; Liber I

Phonosophia anacamptica; p. 3.
Cornell University Library, Ithaca.

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Sarah Finley

Romance 8 is not in fact the only one of Sor Juanas poems to

consider sounds erotic potential and explore Kircherian anacamptics.
Indeed, romancillo heptaslabo 57 also engages the aural vulnus caecum:
No has visto, Fabio mo,
cuando el Seor de Delos
hiere con armas de oro
la luna de un espejo,
que haciendo en el cristal
reflejo el rayo bello,
hiere, repercusivo,
al ms cercano objeto? (1.1320)

Just as in romance 8, Cupids arrow becomes linked to loves reciprocal

effects. While visual language appears to dominate the reflection evoked
in the lines above (espejo and cristal), it is important to note that
rayo can refer to the projection of acoustical or optical species (1.16
18). This aural/visual ambiguity recalls Kirchers geometrical acoustics
by exploiting physical similarities of sight and sound. Auditory resonances elsewhere in these verses strengthen the apparent juxtaposition
of sight and sound and thus recall Sor Juanas aural vulnus caecum. For
instance, repercusivo (1.19) can indicate reciprocal violence: [r]etroceder con violencia un cuerpo, de otro en que ha herido or else refer
to the sympathetic vibrations that cause echo: [s]e toma tambin por
lo mismo que Reverberar, o resaltar (Diccionario de autoridades). Once
more, sound and the vulnus caecum become linked through geometrical
acoustics alignment of Eye and Ear as well as the violent physicality
that often characterizes encounter with a love object.
Visuality, Aurality and the Music of the Spheres
While striking on its own, Sor Juanas aural vulnus caecum also
contributes to the poets broader exploration of sight and sound. In
romance 8, for instance, the conceit prepares a debate about the erotic
effects of voice and aspect:
Tan bella, sobre canora,
que el Amor, dudoso, admira
si se deben sus arpones
a sus ecos, o a su vista:

Embodied Sound and Female Voice in Sor Juana Ins de la Cruzs Canon

199

porque tan confusamente

hiere, que no se averigua
si est en la voz la hermosura,
o en los ojos la armona.
Homicidas sus facciones
el mortal cambio ejercitan:
voces, que alternan los ojos;
rayos, que el labio fulmina.
Quin podr vivir seguro,
si su hermosura divina
con los ojos y las voces
duplicadas armas vibra? (1.1328)

Throughout these verses, Eye and Ear are aligned. The opening lines
juxtapose Cupids dual weapons by attending to Narcisas physical (bella) and harmonic (canora) beauty (1.13). The acoustical significance
of canora[s]onoro, entonado, y que tiene meloda en la voz y
dulzra en el modo de articular y cantar, according to the
Diccionario de autoridadescan lend insight into the aesthetics of Sor
Juanas aurality.
On one hand, the musical representation of beauty in romance
8 and other sorjuanine poems can be interpreted as a symptom of
the Pythagorean inheritance that Paz (314), Ortiz (La musa 259)
and Trabulse (247) have recognized.7 Within the music of the spheres
framework, planetary rotation emitted sound, and the resulting cosmic
consonance or dissonance affected ones worldly experience. Man became a microcosm of the universe whose physical or spiritual properties
could be conceptualized as harmonic relationships. From this perspective, perfect (harmonic) mathematical ratios reflected cosmic order and
also signified beauty. Ortiz rightly argued that for Sor Juana, Pythagorean proportions were an overture to aesthetic pleasure. Beautylike
musicthus appears as a mathematical concept all throughout the
nuns oeuvre (El discurso especulativo musical 358).
Sor Juanas Pythagoreanism and its underlying aurality influenced other themes in her poetry as well. For instance, the concept
resonates within the poets re-imagining of female agency via music
and voice. One example is villancico 220, which draws upon musical
metaphors to represent the Virgin Mary as la encarnacin de la armona perfecta (Miranda 95). In this work, the Virgins consonant song

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Sarah Finley

becomes a microcosm of universal harmony and signifies her heavenly

dominion:
Por los signos de los Astros
la voz entonada suena,
y los Anglicos Coros
el contrabajo le llevan. (2.5255)

Here, Mary intones the otherwise inaudible sounds of planetary

rotation, and angelic choirs accompany with a contrapuntal melody.
The harmony between the two parts corresponds to musical intervals
among revolving celestial bodies and thus recalls the music of the
spheres. For all this, the Virgins supremacy becomes clear: she voices
the entirety of the heavens and as such, her songthe cantus firmus of
the Pythagorean universeinfluences all other cosmic elements.
Descriptions of Narcisas voice in romance 8 engage similar
themes. Consider the following for example: y en los elementos cesa /
la discordia nunca unida (1.78). Here, the heavens harmonize with
the singers Pythagorean echo, and Narcisas song becomes the locus of
(erotic) power. Womens voicing and silence are indeed significant in
these lines and elsewhere in Sor Juanas canon. Electa Arenal, Josefina
Ludmer (88) and Stephanie Merrim (172) interpreted this persistent
aurality through feminist lenses and argued that acoustical references
form a contrapuntalif not femininediscourse. Arenal maintained
that the nun exploited musical references sometimes to flaunt, others
to conceal, her overriding interest in the reorchestration of sounds and
silences. Traditional scores were too discordant and disconcerting to
the ears of (female) intelligence (Where Woman is Creator 12526).
Romance 8 appears to contribute to such reorchestration by drawing
upon aurality to illustrate Narcisas power in lines 7 and 8. Moreover,
resonances of the music of the spheres and other auditory discourses
exceed metaphor and hint at the nuns deeper engagement with early
modern sound culture.
Hearing and musica pathetica
Songs affective capacity and its relationship to female agency
are also significant to aurality in romance 8 and El divino Narciso. Like

Embodied Sound and Female Voice in Sor Juana Ins de la Cruzs Canon

201

geometric acoustics, Renaissance and Baroque explorations of musics

psychological and physiological effects also resonate in Sor Juanas aurality. Specifically, Pythagoreanism combines with Kirchers ideas about
auditory perception and musica pathetica (musics ability to arouse and
alter the passions) to establish a powerful acoustics of womens voice.
Drawing upon links among Boethian musica mundana, musica humana
and musica instrumentalis that were the basis of Renaissance medical
and hermetic treatises, Kircher conceived of music as a potent force that
closely related to temperament.8 He reasoned that soundthe gaseous
product of collisions among displaced air particlesentered the human
ear and came into contact with the humorous vapors that determined
ones disposition. This material similarity between sound and the humors made aural stimuli particularly effective in altering temperament.
Indeed, Kirchers lengthy description of hearing in Musurgia
universalis syncretizes natural philosophy, the music of the spheres and
Aristotelian cognition:
From all this I infer that the marvelous power which music has for
moving the emotions does not proceed directly from the soul, for that,
being immortal and immaterial, neither gives proportion to notes and
sounds, nor can it be altered by them: it comes rather from the spirit
[spiritus], which is the instrument of the soul, the chief point of conjunction by which it is annexed to the body.
The spirit is a certain very subtle sanguine vapor, so mobile and tenuous that it can easily be aroused harmonically by air. Now when the
soul feels this movement, the various impulses of the spirit induce in
it corresponding effects: by the faster or stronger harmonic motions of
the spirit it is excited or even shaken up. From this agitation comes a
certain rarefaction causing the spirit to expand, and joy and gladness
follow. The emotions felt will be stronger as the music is more in accord
and proportion with the natural complexion and constitution of man.
Hence when we hear a perfectly crafted harmony or a very beautiful
melody we will feel a kind of tickling in our heartstrings, as if we are
seized and absorbed by the emotion. These various effects are best promoted by the different modes or tones of music. (On the Nature and
Production 26566)

This passage illustrates the intersection of Pythagorean harmony, musica

humana and Aristotelian perception in Kirchers understanding of musical pathos and, as we shall see, in Sor Juanas. Acoustical and cognitive

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Sarah Finley

theories inform links among sound, Ear and spirit, all related through
their vaporous composition. This physical, embodied aurality becomes
essential to Sor Juanas re-imagining of female voices power.
Such themes turn out to be evident in Scene III of El divino
Narciso, where Eco, Soberbia and Amor Propio react to two choruses
song praising Narcissus and God. First, Soberbia affirms the musics affective impact through a description of her sympathetic response:
SOBERBIA

Yo atend
sus clusulas; por ms seas,
que mucho ms que el odo,
el corazn me penetran (3.1.3.27982).

In these lines, Soberbia attends to songs acoustical and lyrical qualities. She observes that poetic content (sus clusulas) heightens songs
sensibility (por ms seas) and thus intensifies her experience of it
(3.1.3.280). The heart (the seat of the soul) therefore engages song
more strongly than the ears. This privileging of musical affect recalls the
blend of Aristotelian sensory perception, Orphic poetics and Galenic
medicine that inform Kirchers musica pathetica and resonate in Sor
Juanas aurality.
Soberbias remarks particularly draw on early modern theories
of perception and cognition. First, song radiates specieslikenesses
of its sensible qualitiesthat activate its corresponding sense organ,
the ear. This reaction is possible because of physical likeness between
species and organ: air constitutes the medium of sound and also fills
the chambers of the inner ear. Although the choruses song does not
physically alter air in the ear, the organ senses the external stimulus as
different from its ordinary composition. The species then represents
itself to the internal senses as phantasman image or echo in this
case that becomes a sign of the choruses song (or rather, absence in
Giorgio Agambens conceptualization of phantasm, desire and memory
[7576]).
The body responds cognitively as the ear triggers a physical
reaction in the blood vessels connected to it. Both blood and pneuma,
a vital vaporous substance that is essential to internal corporeal balance, are fundamental links between the sense organ and other parts
of the body. These two elements flow through the blood vessels and

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203

carry information from the senses to the heart, the organ most closely
related to the soul. In turn, the heart stimulates the souls perceptual
and intellectual functions (the Aristotelian common sense), which allow the perceiving subject to judge and react to her sensory encounter.9
When Soberbia notes that the choruses song penetrates her heart, she
refers to this complex cognitive process and highlights musics affective properties. The physicality of Soberbias musical experience recalls
Kirchers musica pathetica; specifically, his argument that the material
similarity between sound and the humorous vapors made aural stimuli
particularly effective in altering temperament.
Complementary to such engagement with sensory perception
and cognition, Soberbias comments also highlight affective connections between poetry and music. Read from this perspective, clusulas
becomes a pivotal term whose polysemy draws out songs lyrical and
acoustical content (3.1.3.280). On one hand, the clausula or cursus
could designate a metrical pattern Classical orators used to conclude a
sentence. On the other, the term might also refer to the first examples
of polyphony and more specifically, upper voices that the Notre Dame
School sometimes added to existing plainchant melodies during the
twelfth and thirteenth centuries. It thus becomes unclear whether
song, lyric or a combination of the two intensified Soberbias sensory
experience.
These musico-rhetorical links could not have escaped Sor Juana,
and it bears note that they seem to indicate the broader intersection of
poetry and song in the nuns thought. Continuing, Amor Propios reaction to the choruses song can deepen understanding of how Sor Juanas
Pythagoreanism informs the affective relationship between the two:
Yo tambin, que al escuchar
lo dulce de sus cadencias,
fuera de mi acuerdo estoy. (3.1.3.28385)

Here, Amor Propio notes that the chorus song has made her out of
tune, and Kirchers ideas about music and affect resonate once more. In
addition to the Jesuits engagement with early modern cognitive theories, Claude V. Palisca observed that the music of the spheres persisted
in Kirchers treatment of musical reception in Musurgia Universalis,
from which I quote:

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the sonorous number, as it sets the interior air in motion, impresses on

it the harmonic movements, then animates the imagination. The latter,
in turn, communicates these impulses to the humors, and the humors,
mixed with the vaporous spiritthe interior air, finally move the
person to what they convey. It is in this manner and none other that
harmony moves the passions. (qtd. in and trans. Palisca 195)

According to underlying Pythagorean and Platonic traditions, mans

proportional composition (musica humana) echoed the harmonic
structure of the universe (musica mundana). The harmonies of the soul
thus resonated with those of the cosmos, and each temperament was
associated with precise musical qualities, including modes or pitches.
Consequently, sound could reinforce or alter disposition through a
sympathetic reaction reflecting either consonance or dissonance with
the bodily humors harmonies.
Just as Soberbias response to song engages Kirchers theories
of musical perception, so the Jesuits take on sympathy and musical
pathos resonates in Amor Propios reaction. The choruses refrains
animate the air in Amor Propios inner ear and stimulate her imagination. Underlying harmonies cause a humoral reaction that affects the
sounding numbers in both body and soul. The characters affirmation
fuera de mi acuerdo estoy indicates that the choruses song did not
echo her temperamental harmonies, and the dissonance altered their
balance (3.1.3.285).
Aural pathos and the music of the spheres also resonate in seemingly non-acoustical conceits that develop Sor Juanas embodied takes
on sound. One such topic is the lodestone as a metaphor for attraction
and sympathy in romance 8, where magnetism heightens the poems
aural re-imagining of female voice and agency:
Al dulce imn de su voz
quisieran, por asistirla,
Firmamento ser el Mvil,
el Sol ser Estrella fija. (1.912)

These lines portray Narcisas voice as a magnetic force that exceeds

musica mundana and causes a sympathetic reaction in the cosmos. As
elsewhere in Sor Juanas canon, Kirchers musico-acoustical theories
persist here. Specifically, the Jesuits exceptional syncretism of magnetism, harmony and sympathy appears to inform Sor Juanas metaphor.

Embodied Sound and Female Voice in Sor Juana Ins de la Cruzs Canon

205

Several of Kirchers treatises consider the lodestone a universal force of

attraction that is linked to his esoteric take on the music of the spheres,
including: Magnes, sive de arte magnetica (1643), Musurgia Universalis
and Phonurgia Nova. In these works, themes of magnetism deepen
musics sympathetic impact upon cosmic or human harmonies (musica
mundana and musica humana). For instance, Mariangela Don noted
that Kircher favored the term magnetism for describing musics attractive and curative properties in his discussion of tarantism as well as
elsewhere in Musurgia Universalis (89).10 Such ideas resonate strongly
in Narcisas voice figured as a lodestone whose powerful force disrupts
universal harmony.
For all this, it becomes clear that physical voice was a powerful stimulus in Sor Juanas poetic imagination. Songs harmonies could
reflect musica mundana or musica humana and trigger sympathetic
responses in the listener. Consequently, voices acoustical properties
heightened capacity for verbal communication through their ability
to trigger a pathological reaction. Therefore, song appears to exceed
poetic metaphor through embodied aurality. The allegorical character
Naturaleza Humana explores this very concept in the first scene of El
divino Narciso:
Pues volved a las acordes
msicas, en que os hall,
porque quien oyere, logre
en la metfora el ver
que, en estas amantes voces,
una cosa es la que entiende
y otra cosa la que oye. (3.1.1.14955)

Here, Naturaleza Humana distinguishes between two types of metaphorresonant and reasoned. Veit Erlmanns contrapuntal analysis
of the two concepts can be useful for understanding the distinction:
[w]hile reason implies the disjunction of subject and object, resonance
involves their conjunction. Where reason requires separation and autonomy, resonance entails adjacency, sympathy, and the collapse of the
boundary between perceiver and perceived (10). Erlmanns reading
associates reason with detached observation of sight while resonance
fundamentally acousticalbecomes intimate and participatory. By
evoking songs aural/verbal duality as well as the reason/resonance

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dichotomy, Naturaleza Humana invites observers not only to contemplate the loas allegorical significance, but also to engage aurally through
sympathyphysical and psychic reactions that echo external stimuli
and thus transcend the limits of Self and Other.
Paradigms of Female Voice: Siren Song
In these final sections I consider how concerns about gender
intersect with auditory themes in Sor Juanas oeuvre. As we shall see,
(female) aurality often appears contrapuntal to (male) visuality. In
romance 8, Narcissuss foil, Narcisa, voices her agency through song,
an affective mode that the poem favorably compares to visual beauty.
El divino Narciso likewise explores the interstices of sight and sound
through the allegorical archetypes Narcissuswho falls in love with his
reflected countenanceand Echowhose reflected voice re-sounds and
destabilizes Narcissuss masculine dialogue. As elsewhere, scientific and
musical theories inform Sor Juanas reworking of poetic conceits, and
each piece develops tension between the unfulfilled Ovidian lovers as a
dialectic of visuality (Narcissus) and aurality (Echo). To this end, I will
attend to Siren song and Echo, two paradigms of womens voice whose
construction in Sor Juanas canon illustrates how sound as a feminine
mode responds to male and ocular hegemonies.
To begin, the Siren theme in romance 8 heightens links between
female voice and agency by highlighting the disruptive nature of Narcisas echo:
El mar la admira sirena,
y con sus marinas ninfas
le da en lenguas de las aguas
alabanzas cristalinas.
Pero Fabio, que es el blanco
adonde las flechas tira,
as le dijo, culpando
de superfluas sus heridas:
No dupliques las armas,
bella homicida,
que est ociosa la muerte
donde no hay vida! (1.2940)

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207

These lines portrayal of Narcisas voice recalls the Homeric Sirens deadly song, which can lure unwary sailorssuitors, in this caseto their
deaths. Like the marine enchantresses, Narcisa attracts and wounds her
lover through voice. The Siren conceit underscores the powerful beauty
of womens song and also channels once more the aural vulnus caecum
by highlighting voice as an acoustical weapon. The theme thus contributes to romance 8s reframing of gender discourses as well as aural/visual
tensions that resonate throughout the poem.
Let us further explore the Siren motif s significance. First, romance 8s reflective take on the vulnus caecum resonates in the final two
verses, where Narcisas weapons seem to bounce harmlessly off of their
target and channel themes of echo by initiating a reciprocal response in
the singer (1.3940). Taking note of voices paradoxical repercussions,
Merrim remarked: [i]t [song] may kill them [Narcisas victims], but the
implication contained in Narcisas name, if left unstated in the poem,
is that the song also kills her, the poet-singer (172). Indeed, Narcisa
appears as deadly singer and victim. Just as she recalls both Narcissus
and Echoreflected in her name as well as the nymphs bodily absence
in romance 8, so Narcisa also becomes both Siren singer and the
hapless audience. Complementary to her Narcissan resonances then,
Narcisa also adopts the masculine role of Ulysses and further distorts
the gendered archetypes that the poem engages.
Reading Narcisa as both Siren and Ulysses deepens the relationship between womens voice and agency by portraying aurality as locus
of female intellect. First, Narcisas Siren song appears to exceed finite
knowledge. Adriana Cavareros feminist reading of the Odyssean Sirens
can clarify this point: [t]hey . . . sing words, they vocalize stories, they
narrate by singing. And they know what they are talking about. Their
knowledge is, in fact, total: we know all [idmen], they sing . . . (105).
For Cavarero, the Sirens omniscience is as alluring as their vocal beauty.
In fact, song turns out to be linked to knowledge, and Narcisas Siren
voice likewise becomes the locus of (feminine) intellect. To this end,
the heroines capacity to sound divine universal harmony along with
the poems references to Sirens can be understood as overtures to her
omniscience. Such resonances illustrate the poems paradoxical attitude
towards womens intellectual production, seen as both beautiful and
threatening.
Narcisa as Ulysses also channels themes of intellect and aurality and thus heightens Siren songs power by embodying its reciprocal

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effects. Whereas Cavarero argued that Homers mythic singers voiced

omniscience, Elena Laura Calogero noted in contrast that early modern love poetry frequently associated Ulysses with qualities like moderation and intelligence (151). The heros prudence in stopping up his
ears to escape the creatures threat was essential to such reimaginings.
Once again, aural themes resonate here. Since Ulysses was the Sirens
intended audience or listener, voices complement ear can therefore be
read as a counterpart to the Siren songs omniscience as well as an additional site of knowledge. Narcisas association with Ulysses deepens
connections between womens voice and intellect, sharpens romance
8s disruption of gender paradigms and may also lend insight into the
poems puzzling conclusion. If indeed Ulysses ingeniously thwarted the
Sirens auditory perils, then Narcisa might also evade the threat of her
own voice through cunning and knowledge, by closing her own ears.
Unlike her male counterpart Narcissus, Sor Juanas heroineenvoiced
omniscienceturns out to be capable of eluding loves reciprocal
effects.
Paradigms of Female Voice: Echo
Just as romance 8 draws upon paradigms of womens song to
construct an alternative, feminine knowledge, so El divino Narciso exploits Ecos repercussed voice as counterpoint to Narcisos (masculine)
discourse. Narciso and Ecos duet in Scene XII illustrates particularly
this transformation (Merrim, Mores Geometricae 115). Although the
phonemic contours of Ecos lines duplicate the ends of Narcisos utterances, her voicing alters semantic content. Consider the following
example, in which Eco re-sounds the final words or syllables of Narcisos
queries to formulate a response:
NARCISO
Ms quin, en el tronco hueco,
ECO
Eco.
NARCISO
con triste voz y quejosa,
ECO
Quejosa.
NARCISO

Embodied Sound and Female Voice in Sor Juana Ins de la Cruzs Canon

209

as a mis voces responde?

ECO
Responde.
NARCISO
Quin eres, oh voz; o dnde
te ocultas, de M escondida?
Quin Me responde afligida?
LOS DOS
Eco Quejosa Responde. (3.4.12.164857)

Here, Eco simultaneously reiterates Narcisos hegemonic discourses

and subverts them through partially repeated sound. Because of such
tensions, interpreting the nymphs echo has proven challenging. While
some have viewed the transformation of Narcisos dialogue as a sign of
agency (Glantz 195), others read Ecos vocal dependence upon another
as a metaphor for gender politics in viceregal New Spain (Merrim,
Mores Geometricae 11415).
Indeed, the echoic discourse is complexin part because Ecos
contrapuntal response depends upon its reasoned and resonant significance. While critics like Margo Glantz and Merrim focused upon Ecos
poetic and metaphorical possibilities, Ada Beaupied attended to the
nymphs embodied voice and its resonances with early modern sound
culture. Her reading intersects with topics that this study has considered and can be useful for relating El divino Narciso to other paradigms
of Sor Juanas aurality. Notably, Beaupied observed that the hermetic
association of Eco with sacred wind channels the Pythagorean construction of sound as an echo of divine breath (121). This connection
recalls acoustical themes in Sor Juanas Pythagoreanism and also brings
to mind embodied imaginings of Ecos voice. Indeed, Eco as the breath
of God evokes sounds vaporous nature, which, as previously noted,
makes acoustical stimuli especially apt for influencing temperament. I
will return to this characteristic presently, but first it becomes pertinent
to consider another strand of Beaupieds reading.
Consonant with her hermetic interpretation of Eco, Beaupied also drew out links between Eco and an architectonic figure from
Kirchers Musurgia unviersalis (Figure 2). The Jesuits diagram explores
echos effects upon language by illustrating the repercussed trajectory
of Tibi vero gratias agam, quo clamore? (How shall I cry out my
thanks to thee?; Menke 88). Bettine Menke remarked that the figures
re-sounding of the final clamore self-referentially thematize[s] the

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echos formation. Indeed, amore (love) highlights Ovidian resonances

while other words recall noise (clamore); the figures long tradition
(more); the emanating mouth, speech or face (ore); and the reflecting object (re) (88). Menkes observations suggest that echo en-voices
itself in Kirchers clamore and thus becomes instrumental to the original utterance. Similarly, in El divino Narciso, Eco responds to Narciso
via acoustical repercussion and draws out her response, already embedded in his questions. In this sense, Eco becomes yet another paradigm
that explores the relationship between female voice and intellect, for
the nymphs en-voiced reply anticipates Narcisos query and recalls her
omniscience.

Figure 2. Echoic diagram of clamore; Musurgia Universalis,

sive Ars magna consoni et disoni; Vol. 2; Liber IX
Magia phonocamptica; p. 264.
Cornell University Library, Ithaca.
The question remains: how are we to interpret Ecos troubling
resonance (re-sonns or sounding again)? Drawing upon aural themes
developed in Beaupieds interpretation and elsewhere in this essay, I
maintain that the relationship between Narcisos questions and Ecos
responses might be described sympathetically. Given the persistence
of musica pathetica in Naturaleza Humanas opening reference to resonant metaphor as well as in romance 8s exploration of Narcisas echo,
sounds affective influence and musica pathetica becomes relevant here.

Embodied Sound and Female Voice in Sor Juana Ins de la Cruzs Canon

211

Since Sor Juana appears to have subscribed to Kirchers idea that the
semantic properties of language can intensify sounds affective impact,
Ecos repetition of words like quejosa (3.4.12.1651) and later amar
(3.4.12.1669) signal the nymphs capacity to reflect the sentiments of
Narcisos original utterance back to him through repercussion. Nevertheless, while Eco may feel similar emotions upon hearing Narcisos
voice, her own experience transforms lovesickness and lends a different
meaning to the response. If indeed Narciso pines for his own likeness
in Naturaleza Humana, Eco transposes such feelings via resonance and
voices her own longing for Narciso. Although the nymphs echo may
appear phonemically imitative or perhaps even secondary, themes of
embodied voice and sympathy suggest otherwise. Ecos repercussed
voice therefore becomes a resonance of Narcisos that offers a semantic
and affective reply.
Conclusion
In conclusion, both romance 8 and El divino Narciso develop
embodied womens voice as feminine counterpoint to Ovids tale of
Narcissus and Echo. By exploring the interstices of sight and sound,
acoustics, harmony, desire, sensory perception and universal order
through the Echo motif, these works privilege female voice as the locus
of knowledge as well as for its physical and pathetic effects. Romance
8 replaces Narcissuss visual reflection with Narcisas echoed Siren song
and draws upon musical, philosophical and scientific theories to construct female voice as an alternative to hegemonic discourses. Likewise,
El divino Narciso distinguishes between languages semantic properties
and embodied sounds sympathetic ones. The former becomes linked
to such concepts as sight and logic while the latter echoes universal
harmony and heightens ones sense of the divine. Such tension between
reasoned and resonant metaphor subsequently informs Ecos transformation of Narcisos lovesick lament near the end of the loa. Although
the nymphs deformed repetition of her beloveds lines at first seems
unremarkable, the feminine response in fact constitutes a re-sounding
that semantically and sympathetically exceeds Narcisos original words.
It becomes apparent that aurality in romance 8 and El divino Narciso strongly resonates with early modern sound culture. All

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throughout this essay, I have sharpened understanding of Sor Juanas

engagement with auditory discourses like acoustics, the music of the
spheres and musica pathetica. Athanasius Kirchers Musurgia Universalis
and Phonurgia Nova stand out as likely sources for the poets ideas about
sound, music and hearing. My readings contextualize the relationship
between female voice, silence and agency that others have drawn out
in the nuns canon. Through the lens of aurality, acoustical metaphors
emerge as alternative, feminine discourses and challenge Sor Juanas
apparent visuality. Such echoes of broader themes in Sor Juanas canon
beckon re-readings of sound elsewhere in the poets oeuvre in order to
strengthen musico-acoustical conceits this study has highlighted and
identify additional paradigms.
Christopher Newport University

NOTES
Mario Lavista, Pamela Long, Ricardo Miranda, Mario Ortiz and Octavio Paz have all
advanced understanding of Sor Juanas engagement with early modern music culture.
Likewise, Electa Arenal (Reclaiming the Mother Tongue), Emilie Bergmann, Josefina
Ludmer and Elena del Ro Parra contributed to debates about the poetic significance
of metaphors of voice, music and silence in the nuns oeuvre.
1

Developments in Sound Studies have begun to address these challenges. Renewed

interest in aurality in early modern culture (Erlmann, Gouk, Smith and Tomlinson)
and pre-twentieth-century Spanish America (Baker and Ochoa Gautier) is pertinent
to the essays auditory scope. These and other efforts respond to the marginalization
of sound in cultural canons by elaborating preliminary sonic histories and posing
questions about the aural realms broader significance.

The pioneer of geometric acoustics is Giuseppe Biancani, who proposed that light
and sound waves behaved similarly in Echometria (1620). Marin Mersenne took up
Biancanis ideas and further explored the concepts in LHarmonie Universelle (1636).
Kircher adapted theories of geometric acoustics from both treatises in agreement with
the results of his frequent experiments with music and sound.

There is much to support my hypothesis about Sor Juanas engagement with Kirchers
musical and acoustical treatises. Kirchers works circulated widely in New Spain,
and many have written of Sor Juanas engagement with them. To name only a few,
Marie-Ccile Bnassy-Berling, Jos Pascual Bux, Paula Findlen, Francisco de la Maza,
Ignacio Osorio Romero, Octavio Paz and Elas Trabulse have all notably contributed to
understanding of Kircherian resonances in Sor Juanas canon. Furthermore, epistolary

Embodied Sound and Female Voice in Sor Juana Ins de la Cruzs Canon

213

and archival evidence indicates that at least two copies of the encyclopedic musical
treatise Musurgia Universalis (1650) circulated in the region during Sor Juanas time.
In a letter from February 2, 1661, Alejandro Favin (b. 1624), one of Kirchers New
Spanish correspondents, writes that he is sending 250 reales de a ocho for ten volumes,
including the musical treatise (Osorio Romero 1011). Additionally, Sor Juanas
good friend Carlos de Sigenza y Gngora (1645-1700) indicates in his last will and
testament that he owned a nearly complete set of the Jesuits works. The four volumes
that would complete Sigenza y Gngoras collection, the will goes on to indicate,
were part of the Colegio de San Pedro y San Pablos holdings (17172). Today, two
seventeenth-century copies of Musurgia Universalis are preserved in the Palafox Library.
Bartsch amply attended to the intersection of sight and touch in Antiquity (5868).
Likewise, see Jay (3848) and Clark (2224) for discussions of Eyes complex and
sometimes contradictory significance in medieval and early modern cultures.

Phonosophia anacamptica first appeared in Musurgia universalis, and Kircher

subsequently expanded the essay in Phonurgia Nova.

Both Paz and Trabulse connected Sor Juanas Pythagoreanism to Kirchers in Musurgia
Universalis, whereas Ortiz read it as a vestige of her engagement with Italian Renaissance
theorist Pietro Cerones El melopeo y maestro: Tractado de musica theorica y pratica: en
que se pone por extensor, lo que uno para hazerse perfecto Musico ha menester saber (1613).
7

Bartolomeo Ramos de Pareias Musica practica (1482), Marsilio Ficinos De vita coelitus comparanda (1489) and Tommaso Campanellas Del senso delle cose e della magia
(1590) are several important precursors to Kirchers theories of musics psychosomatic
effects and particularly to his ideas about sounds restorative potential. See Tomlinson
16467 for a discussion of Kirchers engagement with these.
8

For an overview of the Aristotelian sensory process, see Hatfield 95657.

Tarantism was a physical and psychological affliction that the bite of the Lycosa
Tarantula supposedly caused. This condition, which was especially prevalent in Apulia
and other regions in Naples, could be cured with compulsory dancing, induced by a
specific musical stylethe tarantella.
10

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Keywords: Sor Juana Ins de la Cruz, Athanasius Kircher, Sound Studies, music,
female voice.
Palabras clave: Sor Juana Ins de la Cruz, Athanasius Kircher, Estudios de sonido,
msica, voz femenina.

Date of Receipt: July 31, 2015

Date of Acceptance: October 13, 2015