He joined the mendicant Order of Our Lady of Mercy on 4 November 1600, by whom he was sent to the Monastery of San Antolín at Guadalajara to begin his period of novitiate on 21 January 1601.

[4] Téllez had been writing plays for ten years when he was sent by his superiors on a mission to the West Indies in 1615; as a result, he resided in the Spanish colony of Santo Domingo from 1616 to 1618.

After returning to Europe, he resided at the Mercedarian monastery in Madrid, where he took part in the proceedings of the Medrano Academy, competed in the literary tournaments, and wrote for the stage.

[5] Tellez' first publication, the incomplete Cigarrales de Toledo (a work licensed in 1621, but not published until 1624), is a miscellany of short tales, novellas, verses, and three plays.

One of the novellas, Los tres maridos burlados, which may have been derived from Francesco Cieco da Ferrara's Mambriano, and the play entitled El vergonzoso en palacio are considered to demonstrate wit and ingenuity.

The tone of some of his productions caused his rivals to denounce him as a corrupter of public morals to the Council of Castile in 1625, and, though no legal action was taken against him, he may have been reprimanded privately.

Dramatic composition may have still been a part of Tirso's leisure as he grew older, as indicated by how the fragmentary autograph copy of Las quinas de Portugal is dated 8 March 1638, despite the fact that his active career as a dramatist ended two years earlier.

[5] His reputation may have extended beyond the Pyrenees in his own lifetime, as indicated by how James Shirley's Opportunity is derived from El Castigo del penséque; however, his name was almost forgotten until the end of the 18th century, when some of his pieces were recast by Dionisio Solís and later by Juan Carretero.