The research group PROLOPE was founded in 1989 in the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona by Alberto Blecua (its leading researcher) and is nowadays run by Gonzalo Pontón and Ramón Valdés. Its main aim is to accomplish the critical edition of Lope de Vega's complete theatre. PROLOPE is formed by a great team of people, which currently includes about thirty prestigious researchers from across the world (click on Members). Since the group was created, PROLOPE has relied on the financial support of public and private institutions and has collaborated with different organizations (click on History). In order to develop its projects and appropriate functioning, its statement and goals accomplishment, PROLOPE passed a Statute that is also thoroughly gathered in our site.

The preserved theatrical works by Lope, one of the most important and prolific playwrights of the Golden Age and the universal history of literature (see a detailed summary of Lope de Vega's Life and Works in the corresponding section), add up to more than three hundred comedies of certain authorship, apart for those of doubtful attribution. Due to weighty philological reasons, the plays published in the Partes de comedias are the base of our editorial efforts. The Partes de comedias are compilations of twelve pieces mostly printed during Lope's lifetime, although we also take into account and use other ancient testimonies, other prints, manuscripts and, of course, the numerous autograph manuscripts preserved (see the section devoted to Lope de Vega's Theatre Transmission and Edition). The critical edition of the Primera parte de comedias carried out by PROLOPE saw the light in 1997. In 2014, the Parte XIII was published, which means that up to this moment 137 comedies have been edited, prologued and annotated following philological criteria. And we are still on it. The section Comedy Parts offers a list of all those already published; to obtain a full list of comedy editions, whether in Partes or individually, as well as of the essays promoted or generated by our group, see the section PROLOPE's Bibliography. Another of the aims that the group has recently undertaken is the development of digital editions (see issue XX of our journal Anuario Lope de Vega. Texto, literatura, cultura). You can read and consult some of the comedies electronically edited by PROLOPE in the section PROLOPE's Virtual Library.

To put our editions into effect, PROLOPE established some Edition Criteria, which reflect our working method and are also gathered in our site. They are accompanied by several materials that can be helpful for all our collaborators as well as, in general, for any editor of Lope de Vega's theatre or of the Golden Age.

But, apart from the edition of comedies, and searching for a wider echo and exchange of ideas with researchers from across the world, PROLOPE has also devised other forums of discussion. To that effect, we should mention, in the first place, the creation in 1995 of the journal Anuario Lope de Vega. Texto, literatura, cultura, a publication that has already reached its XXI issue (2015). Since 2011 it is published exclusively online (Anuario Lope de Vega. Texto, literatura, cultura's site offers a brief history of the journal and access to its contents). In this same sense, we can also mention the organization of numerous conferences, seminars and international symposia.

Gonzalo Ponton Gijon