t unrelated, as this paper will explore, for in a world in which nothing is as it appears to be, the only thing that one can reasonably fall back upon is oneself and one's abiding sense of what is right. But honor (like appearances) is not quite the same thing as truth or right, and there is thus an interesting contradiction within both Segismundo and the play itself: We are meant to see him as an honorable man, but is this a good thing in the end? Is not perhaps trust a higher virtue than honor?
Before proceeding with an analysis of the character, the play, and Barca's themes within it, a brief summary of the play may be helpful, as will some biographical information on the writer, for his own life and that of his characters are clearly intimately connected to each other.
Life is a Dream, written in about 1635, is both allegorical and philosophical, telling us the story of Segismundo who as a character is in his own way no more real than a dream. The Polish prince has been confined in tower under the care of his tutor, Clotaldo, because astrologers had predicted that he would harm his father, King Basilio. After many years, the king decides to test the character of his son and has Segismundo drugged and brought to the palace where, since he is unaccustomed to human society, he behaves in a crude and violent fashion.
Consequently, he is returned to his confinement and becomes convinced that the episode in the palace was nothing but a dream. Later the people revolt and liberate the prince, but Segismundo is afraid that this new experience may be no more real (to him) than the last. After he is proclaimed king, he realizes that this experience of freedom is not going to end and is real, and yet at the same time he also comes to understand that life in its entirety is nothing but a dream, which is given meaning only by the nobility of each person's actions within their lived reveries and the promise of heaven afterwards.
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