| Tomás Luceño | |
| Birth Date: | 21 December 1844 |
| Birth Place: | Madrid (España) |
| Death Date: | 27 January 1933 |
| Death Place: | Madrid |
| Nationality: | Spanish |
| Occupation: | Playwright and poet |
| Signature: | Firma de Tomás Luceño.svg |
Tomás Luceño y Becerra (21 December 1844 - 27 January 1933) was a Spanish poet and playwright.
He was the son of the first instance judge Manuel Luceño and Juana Becerra, both born in Cáceres . Although he started studying engineering, he left it for law studies, in which he graduated. When he worked as a clerk in the Interior Ministry, the Revolution of 1868 left him unemployed. He did not like the monarchical Restoration at all because he was a republican. In 1871 he entered by opposition as editor of the Senate Sessions Journal, where he became chief stenographer and chief editor until his retirement in 1911. There are numerous anecdotes about him in this position . Once Minister López de Ayala introduced Luceño to a lady in the following way:
—Here you have my friend Luceño, the man who has written the most nonsense in this world.
"Are you a writer?" the lady asked.
To which Luceño responded:
-No ma'am; I am a stenographer.
He worked for the Minister of the Interior and protector of Bécquer, Luis González Bravo ; He was private secretary of the Duke of La Torre in the Ministry of Overseas and of the playwright minister Adelardo López de Ayala until 1879, as well as of the six ministers who succeeded him. He married a native of Tarazona de la Mancha, with whom he had no children. He spent several summers in that town and has a dedicated street there. On two occasions he was part of the Board of Directors of the Society of Authors, established on June 16, 1899 and of which he was one of its first associates. As a comedian he collaborated in the writing of La historia comica de España . On June 20, 1910 he donated a significant number of works to the Municipal Library of Madrid . He died on January 27, 1933 at the age of eighty-eight in his home on Cuesta de Santo Domingo, in Madrid, and is buried in the Sacramental de San Isidro.
Apart from being a comedian, he also stood out as a prolific author of articles on customs in the weekly Blanco y Negro under the heading "Mi teatrillo". He specialized in sainete, a genre of which he was the king in his time along with Ricardo de la Vega and Javier de Burgos, and he is considered the successor of Ramón de la Cruz for his classicism and Madridism . He composed about twenty; He also shone in the boy genre, in whose Madrid dramatic variant he shone with pieces such as the aforementioned Cuadros al fresco (1870), his first piece and with which he came to the fore when it was premiered with great success by the company of the prestigious Emilio Mario. in January 1870 at the Lope de Rueda Theater ; Today it comes out, today...! (1884), in collaboration with Javier de Burgos and with certain shades of sociopolitical criticism; A Sunday at the Rastro, El corral de comedias, El Imparcial's Mondays, Bateo, bateo!, The portals of the palza, The tobacconist's girl, A living uncle, Long live the deceased!, The famous comedienne, The master of doing skits or The buggies, How many, warm, how many?, Fraile fingido, La noche de "El Trovador", El arte por las cielos and the magazine Fiesta nacional, among many others. He made recasts of classical Spanish theater (Calderón, Rojas Zorrilla, Lope de Vega etc.) within the collection La Novela Teatral (1916-1925).
Jacinto Octavio Picón praised his extraordinary wit and grace, which contrasted quite a bit with his serious and distinguished demeanor:
No matter how much wit those around him have, he always says what no one else can think of, taking advantage of both human weaknesses and imperfections or irregularities of the language, with such rare originality that his phrases then spread from word to mouth. mouth, taking his own right to become a citizen in the picturesque language used by people behind the scenes. He speaks little, he does not murmur or curse anyone, his censures do not hurt, his mockery does not hurt, his criticism does not mortify, and he says whatever he wants, without his sayings taking on that bitter aftertaste that in other men seems like a vapor of removed bad passions.
He had a knack for writing humorous and anecdotal verses, which he published in newspapers and magazines of the time and compiled in two books. He was a great observer of human types: people who get up early or stay up late in fresco paintings ; fearful and scoundrels who want to get rid of villas, in Judgment of exemptions ; shopkeepers with little money and customers with less money, in Ultramarinos ; Lottery and bullfighting fans, in Hoy it comes out, today! and National holiday ; sycophants and political asslickers in Amen! or The illustrious sick man ; café comedians in The Modern Theater and A Chick Dog ; cheaters and cheesy in Carranza y Compañía, the turncoats in Las recommendations ; the liberals and anarchists in An Uncle Who Brings It Up and those passionate about flamenco and partying in Los Mondays by El Imparcial . However, he does not relate these types to each other as interpreters of a networked action, unlike, for example, his contemporary and also sainetista Ricardo de la Vega, who had greater success.
Conservative liberal respectful of religion, he tried to educate his public in the reformist ideals of Regenerationism and Krausism . Thus, for example, in A Guy Who Brings It Up, one of the protagonists says:
Civilization is not this... / It is constant work, / the union of humanity / in fraternal bonds; / the factory, the development / of sciences and arts; / and it is, finally, marching / always looking forward, / that only with progress / people can be great.