Modern Age - Spring 2016 - 18

MODERN AGE

SPRING 2016

The surprise is that Don Quixote's deluded commitment to the
kind of chivalry represented by romantic novels results in a demonstration of justice and prudence. When Marcela departs, having
vowed to live free in modest seclusion, some of the bystanders,
smitten with her beauty, "gave signs . . . that they would follow
her, not heeding the unmistakable dismissal that they had heard."
Don Quixote, however, who saw "the arrival of a good exercise of
his chivalry, succoring maidens in need, with his hand placed on
his sword hilt," admonished everyone against pursuing Marcela.
"Whether because of Don Quixote's threats, or because Ambrosio
told them that they must complete the obsequies owed to their
good friend," all the shepherds remained until the funeral was
completed (1.14.106).
The effect is what Cleanth Brooks would call a structure of
irony.10 As happens throughout the novel, many of the more
sophisticated characters who gather around the funeral of the
lovelorn "shepherd" encourage Don Quixote in his literary madness for their own amusement; but the entire pastoral funeral,
with its assumption that a man has died of a broken heart, that
erotic desire is an uncontrollable force worthy of divine honors,
is equally madness brought on by obsession with a literary and
cultural fashion. As Cervantes's narrator slyly intimates, the effect
of the knight's menaces is problematic; nevertheless, he is the
only one to speak up in Marcela's defense. It is his chivalric delusions that effectively counter the Petrarchan pastoral delusions of
sophisticated, presumably sane characters.
And this is how the novel repeatedly works: Don Quixote's
obsessive fantasy serves to reveal not only the illusions of other
characters, indeed of early modern Spanish society, but also, in
subtle fashion, the genuine heroism and romance that lie hidden
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Modern Age - Spring 2016

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Modern Age - Spring 2016

Contents
Modern Age - Spring 2016 - Cover1
Modern Age - Spring 2016 - Cover2
Modern Age - Spring 2016 - Contents
Modern Age - Spring 2016 - 2
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Modern Age - Spring 2016 - Cover3
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