7 posts tagged “quixote”
I went to return to my reading the other day, and found myself recoiling at the thought of going further into Quixote. This was surprising for me as an avid reader, and I explored that feeling a bit further. I realized that within Quixote I had run into the same thing that disenchants me with modern literature: mainly it's own aspect of disenchantment.
As mentioned earlier, Cervantes wrote Quixote as a statement against the pablum of popular literature at the time, these fantastic tales of knights and damsels, wicked giants, powerful enchantments. Cervantes framed Quixote as a penultimate example of the dangers of these tales, someone gone out of their mind with a fixation on magic, honor and adventure. Clearly, Cervantes was not a moralist, censor, or alarmist. He seemed to think of chivalric novels, as they were called, as exceedingly banal, stupid, unrealistic, and non-reflective of modern life. So it is said that Cervantes writes the first modern novel by removing this shroud of myth, and by presenting a basically naturalistic story. There is no magic, there are no dragons, there is no enchantment. It's just normal people living life.
This is of course admirable on one level. It allowed literature and storytelling to become more serious, broadening the aspects of human life it could address. It, on one level is the reason that contemporary film and television is able to tackle life issues in a realistic format, like "The Wire", or "Kids".
But here is where my preferences enter the picture. I have read articles on both "The Wire" and "Kids", which praise them as incredible works of art, profoundly realistic and meaningful as ways of grappling with the challenges of inner city crime and poverty, as well as the challenge of kids being raised without support, adult relationship. I can appreciate both those areas of inquiry, but I have seen neither works. Why? Because I like enchantment, I like a filtered lense, some aspect of the story that is out of the ordinary. This doesn't mean that I don't like serious literature, but there is something about a purely naturalistic setting that seems boring to me.
I read books to learn about other places, ideas, things, and reading 20th century fiction has largely just taken me back to people. The Great Gatsby and The Sun Also Rises both come to mind as books that I could recognize as significant, but which presented little emotional pleasure for me. In contrast, I found Lord of the Rings to be both wildly enjoyable and deeply moving. What's more, I think LOTR also had something to say about the human condition, it had some substance to it, but the Academy has yet to consider it "serious art". Which leads to my second thought...
Quixote seems to break ground in the area of "serious art" by doing what comic authors refer to as "breaking the fourth wall" (pvp link?), which basically amounts to undermining the mythical link in the story. In comics, this means the characters acknowledge the audience, and the fact that they are not real people, that they are actually characters in a comic, and on a deeper level, just arbitrary creations of someone's imagination, having in a sense no real "reality" within themselves.
This of course is Quixote's fundamental flaw. He believes that the knights he read about, and their exploits are in fact real, and sets out on his (mis)adventures in an attempt to emulate them. He does so within a world that is neither magical nor chivalrous, and his efforts are alternately mocked, misunderstood or exploited.
I digress, "breaking the mythic bond"... Cervantes undermines his story as a story through structural devices, downplaying the mythic significance of even his own work. I am about 150 pages from the end of book 1, and the characters in the story have come to a hotel. At this point, I as reader am eager to see existing storylines continue to build, and come to some sort of conclusion. Rather than delivering that, Cervantes introduces a manuscript, found in the hotel. The travelling party asks each other, "Do you want to hear this story?" Rather than going to bed, everyone says "sure, let's hear the story." The priest begins to read a completely separate story that I quickly grow impatient with. I flip ahead and realize it is 75 pages long! That half of the remaining story will be consumed with this novella that has no immediate relation to the events at hand, namely Quixote's "quest" and his neighbor's efforts to retrieve him.
This is Cervantes saying as author, "See, I don't have to follow any rules," and at a deeper level working against the expectations of his audience, denying them the sentimental satisfaction they desire. Modern art has been described as "any art that is aware of itself as art." The fourth wall in comics, Cervantes' denial of expectation both illustrate this point perfectly, in that they are playing against the expectations of their audience and "breaking the rules" of the story/comic.
This aesthetic development, of breaking the rules of one's own genre, makes art self aware, and represents a major development in asking the question of what art means, and what it can become. That said, it can be frigging annoying to read and experience, because it asks the audience to both appreciate the art as art, and also minimize, maintain skepticism about it's overall value and message.
Gerhard Richter, a wildly talented contemporary painter, talked about this process in describing one of his paintings. It was a photorealistic rendering of waves at sea, large canvas. Instead of having sky above the waves, Richter inserted an inverted image of the waves, so that "sky" and "land" were both images of waves moving toward the horizon. He talked, in the attached essay, about the viewers "hunger for beauty" and the way they would crave the satisfaction of the horizon and sky above it. By denying this satisfaction, Richter hoped to draw attention to the way our own hunger for meaning interacts with our experience of art. This is of course meaningful and thought provoking, but it is not satisfying.
And that is my beef, then with Quixote and modern aesthetic in general, is the absence of satisfaction. I understand it is valuable to ask hard questions, explore tough issues within art, but where do we find satisfaction? "Serious art” has consigned satisfaction to the realm of “pop art”, non ambitious film and literature. And to a large extent the popular genres have been happy to take that up. Witness the staggering popularity of romance and fantasy novels, Danielle Steele and Robert Jordan come to mind. They are popular because they keep their promise to their audience, of a story or artwork that delivers some kind of satisfaction, that doesn’t toy around with expectations, stringing the audience along.
I feel like pre-modern “serious art” does this same thing, and it is frustrating to me that modernity brought this divide between serious art and a sense of loyalty to one’s audience. One could of course say the author/artist is making a deeper promise to her audience by not “telling lies” in their art, but sometimes you just want a little satisfaction with your substance.
Cue Rolling Stones guitar riff...
With these arguments and this disquiet I traveled the rest of the night, and at dawn I came upon a way into these mountains, where I rode for another three days, with no direction or goal of any kind, until I reached some meadows, though I do not know on which side of the mountains they may be, and there I asked some drovers where I could find the harshest terrain in the sierra. They told me it lay in this direction. I traveled here, intending to end my life, and as I was entering these desolate places my mule collapsed, dead of exhaustion and hunger or, what I believe is more likely, to free itself of the useless burden it was carrying. I was left on foot, humbled by nature, broken by hunger, not having, and not planning to look for, anyone to help me. (225)
Cardenio, a young courtier, has been driven mad by the loss of his beloved. Seeing her given in marriage to his former friend, he flees to the hills, a broken and shattered person. Consumed by madness he roves the mountains, singing lament and flinging curses at the falsehood of his former love, and his friend.
This character is interesting to the degree that he is completely in earnest. His sorrow and pining for lost love stands in marked contrast to Quixote's contrived penance in that the reader can see he has just cause for lament. Where Quixote has been consistently deluded about the true reality of things, it is precisely the grittiness of that reality which has driven Cardenio into his deluded state.
My reason is so damaged and weak that I do a thousand mad acts, tearing my clothes, shouting in these desolate places, cursing my fate, and repeating in vain the beloved name of my enemy, having no other purpose or intention than to shout my life to an end; when I come back to myself, I am so tired and bruised I can barely move. (225)
It seems that Cardenio is the first character meant to be taken completely in earnest. To be taken on as an object of empathetic concern. Dulcinea, an earlier character, was pitiable in the burden of her beauty, but she spoke and acted from a place of strength, shaped circumstances around her to fit her desire. Here Cardenio has been completely overcome.
It is interesting to think about the depth of C's despair at the loss of love, his bitter grief. There is no check to his sorrow, no moderation on his despair. In a story where much in society has seemed worthy of satire and derision, the shearing pain of betrayed love seems the only thing presented thus far without tongue planted firmly in cheek.
(Finished chap 13)
I feel like this chapter introduces us at a deeper level to the absurdity of Quixote's quest, by having him encounter noblemen of his own class, as opposed to the petty thieves, prostitutes and field laborers he's met. Having supped with goatherds, Quixote and Sancho decide to attend the funeral of a local man who has killed himself because of rejected love. (That character, Grisostomo, provides interesting foil to Quixote in terms of affectation, taking on another role, fueled by imagination.) Traveling with the goatherds Q & S encounter a nobleman, Senor Vivaldo, who has also been traveling in the area, and decided to attend the funeral, drawn by the story of Grisostomo's manner of death.
Both traveling to the same destination, they move on together, and begin conversation. It's here that Vivaldo asks the obvious question of Quixote: 'why are you wearing armor in peacetime?' The peer-to-peer social relationship seems to allow a directness that previous characters could not afford, and as I said, the absurdity of Quixote's action becomes apparent. You get the feeling that, were this story staged today, Q would be walking around a shopping mall in Davy Crockett deerskin clothing, or traveling a bucolic suberb in full army fatigues. There is this sense of him being out of place, and Quixote's initial responses quickly convinces Vivaldo that he is completely out of his mind.
I like what follows: rather than retreating into ostracising silence, Vivaldo probes deeper, asking Q to explain himself and the nuances of his calling. These inquiry's are delivered in complete seriousness, though the narrator makes Vivaldo's true estimation of Q clear.
"These words fully pursuaded the travelers that Don Quixote had lost his reason, and they realized the nature fo the madness that controlled him and felt the same astonishment that was felt by all who came to know it. Vivaldo, who was a very clever person and with a merry disposition, wanted to give Don quixote the opportunity to go on with his nonsense and entertain them for the short distance that remained before they reached the burial site." (p.88)
I resonate with Vivaldo's interest. I imagine myself responding in a similar manner in the same situation, not so much to expose Q to ridicule (it could be said this is part of V's intent), but to unspool the nature of his eccentrism. I've met several people over the last few years who have struck me as completely singular personalities. Perhaps they were a bit touched in the head, whatever the case, it became immediately clear that they were outside of the mainstream of human personality. Rather than being put off by it, I was immediately interested in observing them further, getting to know them and understanding just how different they really were.
Much can be said of the pressure that society exerts upon the individual to conform to general expectations. In school, in work, in any social setting, anything that does not conform becomes a handicap. This is perhaps universal, but to find someone who has, perhaps inadvertently, transcended the grid and framework of generally accepted social behavior is a fascinating experience. As such, I salute Vivaldo for his interest and good humor.
I'm through chapter 10 of the first book, reading the Grossman translation.
I'm intrigued by Sancho Panza's character at this point, specifically the question of his motivation. My exposure to children's versions of this story had Sancho as this simple man, motivated by simple loyalty to Quixote, kind of a 2 dimensional sidekick to DQ's wild eccentrism.
In truth, Sancho is lured into the adventure by the promise of land and titles Quixote promises as spoils of conquest he will use to reward Sancho's service. Rather than simple loyalty, Sancho's dotage on Quixote is quite self serving. He seems blinded by a sense of greed, even if still able to see things as they are. He correctly sees windmills as windmills, not giants, but rather than leave Quixote as a fool, he continues with him, deluded by his thirst for wealth rather than DQ's hunger for chivalric adventure.
At each turn, Sancho eagerly asks Quixote of the island realm that is promised to him, essentially "Is this the adventure that will bring me the wealth you've promised?" When Quixote defeats a monk in unprovoked combat, Sancho hurries to the fallen monk, struggling to remove his habit as a spoil of war.
"And so, let it be said that this aforementioned gentleman spent time time of leisure--which meant most of the year--reading books of chivalry (knighthood) with so much devotion and enthusiasm that he forgot completely about the hunt and even about the administration of his estate; and in his rash curiousity and folly he went to far as to sell acres of arable land in order to buy books of chivalry to read, and he brought as many of them as he could into his house."
(Grossman trans, p. 20.2)
It strikes me that Quixote could be considered in some ways the original geek/nerd obsessive. Comments have been made about Quixote as the original modern novel, and in that case the protagonist can be seen as exactly like the contemporary Star Trek/Wars/Farscape/BSG devotee.
We start as you read above with the obsessive collecting of materials related to his universe of choice, in DQ's case, chivalric tales of knighthood that Cervantes suggests had litte or no connection with reality.
The parallels between Q and contemporary geekdom continue:
"he praised the author for having concluded his book with the promise of unending adventure, and he often felt the desire to take up his pen and give it the conclusion promised there; and no doubt he would have done so, and even published it, if other greater and more persistent thoughts had not prevented him from doing so."
(p. 20.7)
Here we have DQ as the first devotee to fanfiction, or at least he would have been if he hadn't been sidetracked by his desire to actually live out the adventures of his heroes of fiction.
Pre-adventure, Quixote also spends his time having discussions with the village priest about which character was the greatest of all knights. Suspiciously close to heated discussions of who would win in a fight, Captain Picard or Han Solo. I mean the pieces are all here. I can only imagine what Triumph would have said had he encountered Quixote 'in character'.
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So, what does all this mean? It's easy to feel that life has radically changed over time, and in some ways it has. But here we see an example of something that seems really new, obsessive sci-fi fans, but in fact was a response of human psychology present for some time.
It speaks also to the relevance of literary classics, in that they give a glimpse into lives lived centuries ago, and provides a sort of kinship with the people who have come before us. I think that can be a comfort, in the face of the bewildering pace of change in present experience, to see that while many things change, some things stay the same. :)
In short, our gentleman became so caught up in reading that he spent his nights reading from dusk till dawn and his days reading from sunrise to sunset, and so with too little sleep and too much reading his brains dried up, causing him to lose his mind. His fantasy filled with everything he had read in his books, enchantments as well as combats, battles, challenges, wounds, courtings, loves, torments, and other impossible foolishness, and he became so convinced in his imagination of the truth of all the countless grandiloquent and false inventions he read that for him no history in the world was truer."
(p.21.1)
Here is the Quixote translation I'm reading....
So, I'm thinking about keeping a blog as I work my way through Don Quixote. First, this is a long book - it will be helpful to see what I was thinking at each stage of the work. Second, this might be a fun way to engage friends in conversation about stuff I'm immersed in, as it tends to be difficult to communicate, wholesale, my impressions about what I'm reading/watching, etc, even when it is really impacting me.
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Choosing to read Quixote comes as part of a larger process in my reading. After finishing college as an English major, I realized there were these big gaps in my reading--classic books I hadn't read--the Odyssey, Dante's Inferno, etc. So, I set about trying to fill in those gaps. Quixote is the next step in that process.
A second thread at play was a coolness in my attitude toward the literature of the 20eme. I enjoyed 19th century stuff I'd read, but couldn't click with 20th century stuff. So, I decided to kind of start at the beginning, helped by a work of literary analysis, Mimesis, that kind of charted the development of Western lit from the beginning to the present day. Quixote is a next step in that process as well, having recently finished some Dante, Milton, and Spenser. Cervantes' work is arguably, a logical step following those authors' works.
So, here we are!
