SOURCE: Soufas, Teresa S. “María de Zayas's (Un)Conventional Play, La traición en la amistad.” In The Golden Age Comedia: Text, Theory, and Performance, edited by Charles Ganelin and Howard Mancing, pp. 148-64. West Lafayette, Ind.: Purdue University Press, 1994.

In the following essay, Soufas appraises Zayas's La traición from a feminist viewpoint, arguing that literature itself is representative of the social institution from which it stems. She further argues that Zayas is aware of this interdependency, using her writing to critique both the literary and social models of her own society.

… the plots of women's literature are not about “life” and solutions in any therapeutic sense, nor should they be. They are about the plots of literature itself, about the constraints the maxim places on rendering a female life in fiction.

—Nancy K. Miller

… pues ni comedia se representa, ni libros se imprime que no...