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Some Initial Comments on Don Quixote

Posted: Thu Mar 25, 2010 12:02 am
by Robert Tulip
Don Quixote has my sympathy. Sent mad by reading too many fictitious old books, he stands as the embodiment of chivalrous virtue (except for his murderous actions) in an age of squalor.

His "none shall pass" caper reveals itself as the template for Monty Python's Black Knight in the Quest for the Holy Grail.

Cervantes kindly points out that his writing method, improving an Arabic text of unknown provenance, shares much with the chronicles of chivalry. We might note his method shares much with older texts as well, such as the Bible, that are also reputed to be history, and that have as much claim to be fact as the celebrated Man of La Mancha.

Cervantes takes the opportunity of his entertaining buffoonery to satirise the entire courtly world of Holy Spain, safe in the modern confidence that his deft style can deflect any claims of impiety and other unwelcome attention from censors and critics.