Don Quixote (1605 CE) - #38

[Kenia]

A thread to discuss Don Quixote de La Mancha by Miguel de Cervantes! :-)

[Cleo]

How are you doing with this one, Deanna? I'm on Chapter 24 and find I don't have much to say. It's a romp but that's about it so far. I found that his defence of Marcella, the shepherdess, was as sane as I've seen him --- in essence, the shepherds were blind to her feeling, yet DQ understood the situation. Otherwise, he seems blind in all others. Perhaps it's a lesson that unless we see situations through the eyes of others, it's hopeless to understand them ...... I don't know ..... I'm grasping ..... :-Z

[Kendra]

I'm almost on part 2 of Don Quixote and I'm really enjoying it. I decided to watch the videos of the Yale course (http://oyc.yale.edu/spanish-and-portu...) along with it. It's definitely adding some good commentary about how the book is parodying chivalric romances and how readers at the time would have understood some of the humor. But, be warned, the professor does spoil the ending in the first video.

[Cleo]

Thanks for the link, Kendra. I would love to have some guidance. I can see the general parody within the story, but other than the footnotes, I don't have specific references. Perhaps it's simply a funny tale and nothing more than that.

[Deanna]

Thanks for the link, Kendra!

Cleo, I'm still only on chapter three, but will hopefully get caught up soon!

[Deanna]

It seems like every time Don Quixote intervenes, he makes things worse. For example, in chapter four, he finds a farmer beating his servant, and tells the farmer to stop and pay the servant his wages. He leaves thinking that the farmer gave his word, but ends up beating the servant just within his life.

What do you think?

[Cleo]

Deanna wrote: "What do you think? ..."

The more I read of this, the more I think it mirrors life, but Cervantes has it do so in a more hyperbolic sense. How many times have you tried to do good and your actions have been misunderstood? I can think of a number of examples in my own life recently. And Sancho is often blinded to reality by greed from Don Quixote's promises. Does reality get obscured for us by our personal wishes, hopes and expectations? It's worth thinking about. :-)

I think where the subtlety breaks down for me is that Don Quixote never seems to learn from his own actions.

[Kendra]

It seems like a lot of people in this group are not the biggest fan of this book! I am actually finding it very entertaining and I'm enjoying it more and more as I go along. I'm a couple chapters into part 2 and there is definitely a shift in style. In a lecture about this book it was said that part 1 is Renaissance and part 2 is Baroque. I don't yet entirely understand what the lecturer meant by that but the decade separating the two parts is definitely noticeable.

[Kendra]

*very minor spoiler*

I just read this in part 2: "On the way, the cousin said to Don Quixote that they should stop at the hermitage for something to drink. As soon as Sancho Panza heard this he turned his donkey toward the hermitage, and Don Quixote and the cousin did the same, but as Sancho's bad luck would have it, the hermit was not at home, which is what they were told by an assistant hermit whom they found in the hermitage."

I thought the irony in this was hilarious. A hermit who had an assistant and who was not at the hermitage. Brilliant!

[Kendra]

I've finally finished after five months! I have so much I want to discuss but a lot of it surrounds a major spoiler. What is the group's policy on spoilers in discussions?

[Cleo]

I've already read it (although my memory might be hazy about the spoiler to answer it properly) so I'm fine with it. You can also put it in the spoiler format.

[Kendra]

Alright, well then here I go.

This book didn't really hit me hard until the end.
(view spoiler)[I learned pretty early on that Don Quixote was going to die at the end but it turned out to be a profoundly sad scene to me. At the end, he realized that everything he had been living for was meaningless and he seemed full of regret. I found it especially interesting how his friends and family tried to comfort him with his delusions even though he came to his senses and realized what was true and what was false.

Another thing that hit me was how, as I watched the Duke and Duchess use Don Quixote and Sancho as toys for their entertainment, I (as the reader) became kind of protective. I thought the actions of the Duke and Duchess were cruel and mocking. But doesn't that point the finger back at me? Aren't I gaining amusement and pleasure by watching these two characters make fools of themselves too? (hide spoiler)]

[Sara]

I agree with you that the ending is really sad! I found the following quote poignant to his state of mind: "My judgment is now clear and unfettered, and that dark cloud of ignorance has disappeared, which the continual reading of those detestable books of knight-errantry had cast over my understanding...my sole regret is that the discovery comes too late to allow me to amend my ways by reading others that would enlighten my soul." I think that through Don Quixote's change of heart, Cervantes is arguing that the reader must take an active role in what they choose to read. To Cervantes, perhaps it was important not to fill ones head with literature "fluff" instead of books that would inspire one to live a meaningful life. The entire novel is an allegory, I believe, intended to cause reflection on one's process of reading and how it can consume us. Don Q seemed to symbolize idealism while Sancho, his counterpoint, symbolized realism. Don Q's madness comes from focusing only on the ideal world he has created for himself, actively choosing to ignore reality (seeing castles instead of inns, giants instead of windmills). Cervantes uses satire to suggest at the beginning of the story that one needs to be careful of taking literature too seriously and at the end of the book I think he returns to this in how Don Quixote ultimately feels about his life.

I also found the Duke and Duchess to be really horrible to Don Q. There are many reactions to Don Q's quest in the book (anger, indulgence, mirth, trickery) but no one ever seems to admire him and there seems to be a universal scoff at his different nature. I believe that we are meant to dislike the Duke and Duchess because Cervantes is showing the reader that aristocrats are not always more respectful or noble than the peasantry which is evident in the treatment he received from them vs. what he received from Sancho, for instance. I think that you point out a good lesson to take away from the book by bringing up that the reader is not blameless either since we get entertainment from the novel as well. I hadn't thought of it that way before!

I really enjoyed reading this book, but I found his views on women and beauty to be really tiresome and his focus on the "ideal lady" to be really annoying. I know that some of this stems from the time in which it was written, and however forward thinking a novel might be it is still a product of its time, but it was quite irksome to me. Some of the book really dragged for me but I think that overall the novel had some interesting things to say on the ideas of morality and society.