History Literature / DonaBarbara

[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/30923276.jpg]]

The book was adapted into a Mexican movie in 1943, with actress Maria Felix playing the titular character, with author Rómulo Gallegos helping with the script. It has also been adapted into many {{telenovela}}s in both Venezuela and Mexico.

-> "''Killing the centaur! Don't be a fool, Santos Luzardo! You think that about the centaur is pure rethoric? I can assure you it exist. I heard it neight. Every night comes around here. And not only here; There, in Caracas, too. And even further yet. Anywhere one of us go, us with the Luzardo blood, can hear the centaur. You heard it too, and that's why you're here. Who said is possible to kill the centaur? Me? Spit on my face, Santos Luzardo. The centaur is a enthelechy. One hundred years has been galloping in this land, and will remain for another hundred. I believed myself to be a civilized man, the first of my family, but it changed when they told me "come to avenge your father" for the barbarian to return to me. The same happened to you; you heard the call. I will see you on her arms and go mad for a caress of hers. The devourer of men!"''

* ArcWords: "This land doesn't forgive"

* AlcoholicParent: Lorenzo Barquero, being TheAlcoholic, is this to Marisela. He doesn't really take care of her, with Juan Primito being the one who helps her the most. He does, however, loves her deep down, [[spoiler: as a drunk Lorenzo tries to defend Marisela from Mister Danger who tried to rape her.]]

* BookDumb: The people of the Venezuelan flatlands are shown to be quite ignorant, prone to malapropers, and superstitious. This is actually TruthInTelevision, due to the education of Venezuela outside of Caracas not being very good during those days. Juan Primito hardly speaks well, and before being taken by Santos, Marisela was more like a feral child.

* CattleBaron: Doña Bárbara is the Latin American (in fact, Venezuelan) take on this trope, and a female one, to boot. In fact, whenever wealthy people from "El Llano" (the Venezuelan flatlands) appear in Telenovelas they tend not only to represent this trope, but reference Doña Bárbara in a way or another.
* CharacterDevelopment: Marisela, thanks to Luzardo help, becomes a better person through the book, going from almost a feral child to a civilized lady. By the third part of the book, she decides to get back to her old home in "La Chusmita", and couldn't take any of it.
* TheDreaded: Doña Barbara is feared throughout the region, with the population making up stories about her and how she obtained her fortune. It helps that she had allies in the form of dangerous criminals like the Mondragons, knew all sorts of sorcery, learned from the indigenous population, and she believed to be talking with some sort of spirit which she called "partner" (El Socio).

--> '''Mister Danger''': ''He is beyond repair, doctor. Leave him end his own misery. He doesn't want to live. He is still in love with ''Barbarita''. Terribly so, and he drinks and drinks to forget her. I told him many times: "Don Lorenzo, you're killing yourself". But he doesn't want to listen, and doesn't take the drink out of his mouth.

* FeudingFamilies: The family of the Luzardo and the Barqueros, while from the same bloodline (being cousins), fought over the control of Altamira for the sake of its name, with the Luzardo brand wanting it to kept it as "Altamira", while the Barqueros wanted it to be renamed as "La Barquereña". This brought members of both families into conflict, and by the time Santos Luzardo was eight years old, his father killed his son and then committed suicide over this. Santos and Lorenzo are the last of their families. Santos doesn't want this family discord anymore, and tried to convince Lorenzo Barquero, who is a shadow of his former self and found baffling that "a Luzardo is in the house of a Barquero", to accept his friendship.
-->: '''Santos Luzardo''': ''I'm Santos Luzardo, and I come to offer my friendship.
* GenderBlenderName: Minor character Maria Nieves, who despite the name, is a dude. The character is based on a man of the same name the author knew from his travels through the country.

* InSeriesNickname: Doña Barbara is known by several nicknames due to her [[TheDreaded reputation]], which includes "La cacica de Arauca" (Arauca's chief), and "La devoradora de hombres" ([[TheVamp The devourer of men]]), among others. Mister Danger also affectionaly calls her "Barbarita".

* ParentalNeglect: Doña Barbara never took well the fact she was a mother, and left Lorenzo and her daughter to rot in some cabin in "La Chusmita", far way from her presence. She also never develops any sort of paternal love for her child, but see her as competition for Santos affection. At the end of the book, when Marisela ask her for support in order to leave to another town, Doña Barbara helps her not out of love, but because she would leave Santos to herself.
* PosthumousCharacter: Some characters in the tale are very important to the core motivations of the main protagonists, but they have been dead for decades. Asdrubal was a poor guy who wanted to go to Manaos, and offered his service to "Taita", Doña Barbara caretaker. He teached her how to read and write, and was her first love. One day, however, he was killed by the three men who later raped Barbara. That was 25 years before the events of the book, but Doña Barbara [[TheLostLenore still has a strong memory of him.]]
* SlobsVersusSnobs: The conflict of the story is about Civilization, represented by Santos Luzardo (A man who left the flatlands behind and went to the city of Caracas to study as a lawyer) and Barbarism, represented by Doña Barbara, a woman who uses sorcery, seduction and controls through fear Altamira, which she renamed "El Miedo" ([[NamesToRunAwayFromReallyFast The Fear]]). Likewise, Santos Luzardo has to deal with her through the law, avoiding the way everyone on the population fell to the "ley del llano" (law of the llano), which meant honor-killing.
* UsefulNotes/SpanishAmericanWar: The war is briefly touched on the Luzardos family BackStory, where many of its members went on to serve to both the United States and Spain. Santos's father was an avid supporter of Spain, and was devastated after its defeat.

On his way there, Santos Luzardo meets Marisela, the daughter of Doña Barbara and Lorenzo Barquero. Barquero is Santos cousin, who was his idol and main inspiration growing up, but has been corrupted by the ''devourer of men'' who turned him into [[TheAlcoholic an drinker]] and took his lands. Marisela, who has been raised by a dumb worker from the ''Doña'', is taken by Santos in an attempt to educate her.

The book was adapted into a mexican movie in 1943, with actress Maria Felix playing the titular character, with author Rómulo Gallegos helping with the script. It has also been adapted into many {{telenovela}}s in both Venezuela and Mexico.

''Doña Barbara'' is a 1929 novel by Venezuelan author Rómulo Gallegos. It's the story of Santos Luzardo, a man who is returning to his native land of Altamira. It has been taken over by the woman known as Doña Barbara, an infamous woman with a dreadful reputation who has renamed the place as ''El Miedo''. There, he will try to recover the place by legal means, while his friends try to tell him to kill Doña Barbara and be a man.

''Doña Barbara'' is a story of Barbarism versus Civilization, inspired by the sociopolitical situation of UsefulNotes/{{Venezuela}} under the regime of Dictator Juan Vicente Gomez. Despite being an allegorical criticism of of the Gomez government, the General liked the book and gave it his blessing. In fact, the book gave its author a good reputation among the people of Venezuela, and was a factor in him becoming president in 1948... before being taken out by another dictator, Marco Perez Jimenez, nine months later.

* AffectionateNickname: In the book, Juan Primito calls Marisela "Niña de mis ojos" (Light of my eyes).

* SpanishAmericanWar: The war is briefly touched on the Luzardos family BackStory, where many of its members went on to serve to both the United States and Spain. Santos's father was an avid supporter of Spain, and was devastated after its defeat.

The novel briefly became infamous due to Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez calling then President UsefulNotes/GeorgeWBush "Mister Danger", like a character from the book, who was an EvilColonialist.

-->-- ''Lorenzo Barquero''

* AffectionateNickname: In the book, Juan Primito calls Marisela "Niña de mis ojos".

* RapeIsASpecialKindOfEvil: Doña Barbara, the main antagonist of the book, was raped when she was a child by three men after her boyfriend was killed by the then. Mister Danger then tries to rape poor Marisela, but is stopped.