  yerma (i.e., "barren" in spanish) is a play by the spanish dramatist federico garcÃ­a lorca. it was written in 1934 and first performed that same year. lorca describes the play as "a tragic poem." the play tells the story of a childless woman living in rural spain. her desperate desire for motherhood becomes an obsession that eventually drives her to commit a horrific crime. because of the time she is living in, she is expected to bear children. when she cannot, she is forced to measures that those in her society would view as extreme. although critics speculate that yerma kills her husband in the end because he is a frugal, economically driven man who has no desire to have children, the play is indeterminate on this issue. she kills him at a hermitage, a religious place with the possibility of fertility. however he has already shown no desire to have children, so there is no evidence that he would have changed his mind at the festival. ==plot== * act 1, scene 1: yerma has been married two years. she wants to strengthen her husband, juan, so he can give her children. telling yerma to stay at home, juan goes back to his work in the olive groves, and yerma talks and sings to the child she wishes she were carrying. marÃ­a, married five months and already pregnant, asks yerma to sew for the baby. yerma fears that if she, too, doesn't conceive soon, her blood will turn to poison. the couple's friend, vÃ­ctor, sees yerma sewing and assumes she is pregnant. his advice when he learns the truth: try harder. *act 1, scene 2: yerma has just taken juan his dinner in the fields. on the road home, she encounters an old woman who insists that passion is the key to conception. yerma admits a secret longing for vÃ­ctor but none for juan. she then meets two girls whose attitudes astonish her. one has left her baby untended. the other is childless and glad of it, although her mother, dolores, is giving her herbs for pregnancy. next vÃ­ctor comes along, and the conversation between vÃ­ctor and yerma becomes tense with unspoken thoughts and desires. juan enters, worrying about what people will say if yerma stays out chatting. he tells her he intends to work all night. yerma will sleep alone. *act 2, scene 1: it is three years later. five laundresses
1934_plays Plays_by_Federico_GarcAa_Lorca