The present essay is devoted to the role of chivalry books in Cervantes’s Don Quixote. The very plot of the novel is based on the collision of foolish fantasies contained in chivalry books with the realities of the author’s time. But Cervantes not only clearly presents to the public all drawbacks and shortcomings of chivalry romances, he transforms his protagonist in a grotesque funny parody of knight errant whose follies imitate imaginary feats of literary heroes. This is the best way to denounce and ridicule the illusory world of knights’ fairytales full of enchanters, fantastic creatures and impossible exploits. Don Quixote is actually a comic chivalry book intended to amuse the reader by showing him how funny and absurd were the incredible adventures of literary knights errant.
Chivalry books play the key role in Cervantes’s novel, and this role is definitely negative, actually, they trigger the narrative by driving mad a fifty years old country gentleman, Alonso Quixano, who becomes a self proclaimed knight-errant Don Quixote of La Mancha. The author explains how it happened: “His fantasy filled with everything he had read in his books etc. citation” (p.21) giving us the idea about the typical contents of chivalry romances on the one hand and expressing his attitude towards it on the other.
Friends of Alonso Quixano, the priest and the barber, as well as his niece and housekeeper perceive chivalry books almost as evil creatures who enchanted the poor man and deserve capital punishment for this crime. That’s why after the examination of our ingenious gentleman’s library “more than a hundred large volumes, very nicely bound”(p.45) are sentenced to burning, and only a few most original and well written are spared. This episode informs the reader about the quantity and quality of chivalry romances available in Spain by the end of the sixteenth century. According to the priest’s and the barber’s judgement, the majority of such books were generally similar containing different versions of a limited number of fantastic plots and had little literary value.
The reader learns much more about chivalry books in Chapter XLVII of Volume One from the lips of the canon of Toledo who finds them “prejudicial to the nation” because being “all essentially the same” they are “foolish stories meant only to delight and not to teach”.(p.412). The indignant cleric enumerates several incredible plots invented by writers of chivalry tales: “a boy of sixteen, with one thrust of his sword, fells a giant as big as a tower and splits him in two as if he were marzipan”; the hero of the book wins more than a million of enemies “only through the valour of his mighty arm”; “a hereditary queen or empress falls into the arms of an errant and unknown knight”; “a great tower filled with knights sails the seas like a ship, and is in Lombardy at nightfall, and by dawn the next day it is in the lands of Prester John of the Indies”. The well-educated clergyman is not against fantasy in general but believes that “fictional tales must engage the minds of those who read them, and by restraining exaggeration and moderating impossibility, they enthrall the spirit and thereby astonish, captivate, delight and entertain.”(p. 412).
Dian Fox indicates that ” for the Canon of Toledo, fiction can only delight when it adheres to the logically possible”, whereas ” the books of chivalry condemn themselves by invading the realm of the fantastic, by violating verisimilitude” (p.408). The erudite cleric believes that in knights’ tales “the style is fatiguing, the action incredible, the love lascivious, the courtesies clumsy, the battles long, the language foolish, the journeys nonsensical, and since they are totally lacking in intelligent artifice, they deserve to be banished from Christian nations”(p. 412). He blames “those nonsensical chivalry books”(p.427) “for being deceptive and false and far beyond the limits of common sense, and for giving the ignorant rabble a reason to believe and consider as true all the absurdities they contain.” (p.423). All the above opinions are entirely shared and supported by the village priest, true friend of Alonso Quixano (p.413).
Instead of useless fairytales the Canon of Toledo recommends to read books about real historical figures and their heroic deeds arguing that from such studies the reader “emerge learned in history, enamored of virtue, instructed in goodness, improved in his customs, valiant but not rash, bold and not cowardly”(p.424). But all reasonable arguments against chivalry books are wasted on the insane Manchegan who likes them because “they drive away melancholy, and improve your spirits if they happen to be low”, and appreciates “great pleasure and delight” which derive from “any part of any history of a knight errant”(p.430) .
In other words, our ingenious gentleman dissatisfied by the realities of the surrounding world is searching refuge in foolish fantasies promulgated by chivalry books. Today the same phenomenon of evasion from disturbing reality can be observed among young people plunging in the virtual world of videogames and internet gadgets and as a result becoming as vulnerable to the challenges of the real life as Don Quixote.
The reader can easily take the Canon of Toledo and the village priest for spokesmen of Cervantes’ own ideas, but according to Antony J. Cascardi, the two Churchmen express, most probably, the opinion of official authorities finding all useless fantasies potentially “prejudicial to the nation”. Cascardi informs that similar point of view on chivalry books was already published by Miguel Sanchez de Lima in 1580,(p.34) and believes that the criticism of literary fictions by clergymen can represent a hint on Inquisition practices of censorship (p.40). In the context of the humorous nature of Don Quixote, the very idea of the Church censoring fairytales for the lack of verisimilitude , definitely, looks ridiculous.
Cervantes clearly understands that mere criticism of chivalric nonsense is not enough to dissuade the fans of fantastic adventures of imaginary knights errant , and creates a funny parody of chivalry books choosing laughter as the best weapon against these fictional writings. As Daniel Eisenberg indicates, “Cervantes wrote Don Quixote to make us laugh at the amusing misadventures of a burlesque knight-errant” in order “to end the great popularity of romances of chivalry”, and “to supply what they could not offer: entertainment that was not only harmless but beneficial” (article p.1).
Actually, the author of the famous novel declares in the Prologue that his work “intends only to undermine the authority and wide acceptance that books of chivalry have in the world and among the public” and adds that it “should move the melancholy to laughter, increase the joy of the cheerful”(p/8).
P.E. Russell proves in his article Don Quixote as a Funny Book that “for some two centuries after 1605, Don Quixote seemed to its readers to be a funny book” (p.319). And indeed, “a great deal of it is concerned with describing tricks and hoaxes, with making sport of the protagonist, his squire, and many other characters”(p.312).
E.C. Riley defines Cervantes’s description of Don Quixote and Sancho Panza as “the verbal equivalent of graphic caricature”(p.110) and perceives them as “a recognizable duo of fat-man and thin-man comics”(p.112).
In Daniel Eisenberg’s opinion, modern critics do not quite understand how ridiculous Don Quixote is because they are not aquatinted with the romances of chivalry of the Spanish Renaissance. The protagonists of chivalry books were young, handsome, strong knights in shining armors on mighty destriers (battle horses) who travelled in such exotic places like Asia, Africa, England or Greece whereas Don Quixote was just the opposite and chose “the least attractive region of Spain”, La Mancha, for his sallies. His very name “de la Mancha” was perceived as a joke in Cervantes’s times. Don Quixote “chooses a far, garrulous, ignorant, greedy, unhappily married peasant as his squire”. His romantic love to a peasant girl also looked laughable for contemporary readers.
According to Judith A. Whitenack, all Don Quixote’s antics reproduce in comic and absurd form well-known plots of chivalric adventures, for instance, “the knight aids the army of a Christian king against a Moorish one (the rebaños, or armies of sheep); he challenges evil giants (the windmills); an enamoured lady pays him a nocturnal visit (Maritornes); he rescues a lady from her kidnapper (the vizcaíno or Basque); he avenges a slain knight (the funeral procession); he challenges a wild beast (the lion); he competes in jousts and tournaments (his plans for the St. George’s Day tournament in Zaragoza); he defends his lady’s beauty against all comers (the Toledo merchants); he is whisked away on quests by mysterious means (the enchanted boat); and he changes chivalric epithets according to circumstances (“El Caballero de la Triste Figura,” “El Caballero de los Leones”)”.She remarks that “the full parodic effect of the novel depends upon readers who will immediately recognize the chivalric material”(p.62) .
The strange Don Quixote’s madness also provoked laughter because, as P.E. Russell explains, mental insanity, provided it was not too violent, was considered funny at that time.(p.321). Dian Fox adds to this that the crazy knight occasionally comes close to killing some of his imaginary enemies, “but true to the nature of comedy, he never inflicts lasting injury on anybody in either part”(p.409).
Don Quixote’s mind is completely deranged by the chivalric nonsense he read, that’s why “everyday things are transformed in his mind’s eye – windmills become giants, sheep warriors, inns castles, etc”.(Riley, p.111). Diane Chaffee-Sorace remarks that the ingenious gentleman “interprets people and situations in terms of chivalric fantasy in order to integrate them into” his illusory world (p.209), and then “fabricates his own adventures by imposing his magic world on the people around him”(p.216). In this way, chivalry books are responsible for all lunacies committed by Don Quixote.
Our ingenious gentleman leaves home with the intention of “righting all manner of wrongs, and, by seizing the opportunity and placing himself in danger and ending those wrongs, winning eternal renown and everlasting fame”(p.21). But in reality all Don Quixote’s adventures are useless, absurd and most harmful for his own health. E.C Riley qualifies, for instance, as “one of his most pointless acts of lunacy” the protagonist’s combat with windmills, and wittily adds: “like all the best fairytale giants, windmills are also rather comic (waving their arms and getting nowhere)”(p.114).
In Chapter L of Volume One Don Quixote affirms that “since he became a knight errant he had been valiant, well-mannered, liberal, polite generous, courteous, bold, gentle, patient, long-suffering in labors, imprisonments and enchantments”(p.430). Whereas E.C. Riley finds the insane Manchegan “in his early, maddest days, capricious, misdirected, impractical, idealistic, militant, ineffective”.(p.115). What a striking difference between the protagonist’s distorted self-evaluation and the analyst’s objective opinion!
The initial folly of the ingenious gentleman takes shape encouraged by the typical picaro of innkeeper who knights him in the presence of “ladies of easy virtue”. In this way external conditions contribute to the appearance of the imaginary character born in the head of Alonso Quixano deranged by the reading of chivalry books. According to P.E.Russell, it happens because of specific attitude towards mad people in Cervantes’ times – they were to some extent untouchable. That’s why in Chapter III of Part I the innkeeper “warns the muleteers not to try to revenge themselves for the wounds inflicted on them by the knight . For the same reason, when the constabulary are sure he is mad, they leave him alone.”(p.322).
Cervantes writes a parody of chivalric fairytales and cares to reproduce their fictitious quality, that’s why starting from Part Two of Volume One the insane Manchegan is presented as the protagonist of the story written by Cide Hamete Benengeli, an Arab Historian, and in such a way he is completely detached from the real life and even from the author of the novel who is not responsible any more for the mad knight’s follies. In this connection Diane Chaffee-Sorace correctly points out that “Don Quixote and the other characters in the book are, after all, as fictitious as the tales of chivalry which Cervantes mocks”(p.218).
Sancho Panza, as a grotesque parody of a gallant squire, is as comic as his master. This peasant “without much in the way of brains”(p.55) clearly sees that Don Quixote is mad but believes that the self-styled knight errant can make him governor of an insula. Sancho Panza enters the imaginary world of our ingenious gentleman in search of possible gains and in Volume Two becomes, according to the duchess, even funnier and crazier than his master.
Don Quixote can be easily manipulated by everyone who read about fantastic adventures of knights-errant. In this connection Judith A. Whitenack indicates : “The willful deceivers of Don Quixote, like the priest and the barber, Dorotea, Sansón Carrasco, the duke and duchess, and Altisidora, are also readers of the books of chivalry and thus know very well how to invent chivalric plots that fit Don Quixote’s expectations”.(p.62)
By the end of Volume One the heroic knight-errant is physically broken by the collision of his imaginary world with harsh realities of life but does not recover his mental sanity. In Volume Two Don Quixote is already a famous literary character living inside a chivalry book and has to follow the turns of the plot written by others. For instance, “the duke and duchess deliberately abuse Don Quixote by staging events to generate his chivalric antics”(p.216), remarks Diane Chaffee-Sorace. In this way in the duke’s castle he is not guided anymore by his mad imagination but is just reacting to unbelievable situations in which he is involved. In this connection Anne J. Cruz remarks: “But the less opposition there is to his fantasies, the more lucid Don Quixote becomes”(p.844).
In the artificially created fantastic world of chivalry books the protagonist’s disappointment is growing and attains its culmination after his defeat by the Knight of the White Moon. Paradoxically, the literary Don Quixote cannot survive the fictitious adventures staged for him by ill-intentioned playwrights. In this situation “accepting his inability to assume a self-invented role in his own story, Don Quixote refuses to continue his portrayal of a knight-errant”(p.840), indicates Anne J. Cruz.
This disillusionment in knight-errantry leads the protagonist to mental recovery and final transformation into Alonso Quixano the Good who recognises his madness and blames chivalry romances for it. In this way, Cervantes presents chivalry books as incompatible with real life where Don Quixote is just a product of unbridled imagination of insane Alonso Quixano.
The humorous effect in the novel is also created by the author’s language. In Daniel Eisenberg’s opinion, Spaniards are correct claiming that Cervantes’ verbal humour is to some extent untranslatable. For instance, words (examples) can only be explained but never translated. Fortunately, I read the novel in Spanish and can better catch the humoristic spirit of Cervantes’ narration.
In conclusion it is important to stress that Don Quixote represents a funny parody of chivalry books which is intended to ridicule the knights-errant from fairytales so popular at that time. Today the comic character of Cervantes’ work is considerably shaded by the difficulty of reading in the Golden Age Spanish and by its general perception as the world classic. Definitely, for correct understanding Don Quixote should be studied in the historical perspective and compared with chivalry romances parodied by its author. In my opinion, P.E. Russell is quite right when proving that for Cervantes’ contemporaries “Don Quixote was simply a brilliantly successful funny book”.(p.312).
Bibliography:
Cervantes, Miguel. El Ingenioso Hidalgo Don Quijote de la Mancha. Barcelona: Austral, Edicion Alberto Blecua & Andrés Pozo, 2012.
Chafee- Sorace, Diane. “Ekphrastic and Theatrical Interior Duplication: Irony and Verisimilitude in Don Quijote’s Adventure with the Basque.” Romanische Forschungen 101 (1989): 208-20. Print.
Cascardi, Anthony. “What the Canon Said.” Cervantes, Literature and the Discourse of Politics (2012): 20-48. Print.
Cruz, Anne. “Don Quijote’s Disappearing Act.” Print.
Eisenberg, Daniel. “Teaching Don Quixote as a Funny Book.” Modern Language Association of America (1984): 62-68. Print.
Fox, Dian. “The Apocryphal Part One of Don Quijote.” John Hopkins University 100.2 (1985): 406-16. Print
Riley, E.C. “Don Quixote: From Text to Icon.” Cervantes: Bulletin of the Cervantes Society of America (1988): 103-5. Print.
Russell, P.E. “”Don Quixote” as a Funny Book.” The Modern Language Review 64.2 (1969): Pp. 312-326. Print.
Whiteack, Judith. “Don Quixote and the Romances of Chivalry Once Again: Converted Paganos and Enamoured Magas.” Cervantes: Bulletin of the Cervantes Society of America 13.2 (1993): 61-91. Print