The Fatherland on Stage: Chilean Theater During the War of the Pacific

This article focuses on the study of plays written and performed in Chile during The War of the Pacific, whose main topic was the war itself. If we take into consideration that this war was a paradigmatic instance for the consolidation of common imaginaries in Chilean Society, our hypothesis states that the existence of a patriotic theater sprung from exceptional circumstances thus transforming itself into an effective instrument to connect people with the war. This was done through satirizing the enemy and portraying Chileans as model examples of civic duty. Although the relevance of these plays has been minimized by historical studies of national theater, their abundant production, the limited time in which they remained current and their patriotic purpose -that was greater than their esthetic or literary claims- gives them a unique historical value. They are testimonials of collective perceptions of the conflict and they work as a modal framework of theater in the period immediately after the end of the war.