15. Don Quixote, Part II: Chapters XII-XXI

Cervantes’ Don Quixote (SPAN 300) González Echevarría starts by reviewing the Spanish baroque concept of desengaño. He proposes that the plot of the Quixote and some of the stories in part two unfold from deceit (engaño) to disillusionment (desengaño). He then turns his attention to Auerbach and Spitzer’s essays included in the Casebook (“Enchanted Dulcinea“ and “Linguistic Perspectivism“ respectively) that try to describe what González Echevarría calls the “Cervantean,“ the particularities that define Cervantes’ mind and style. In the second part of the lecture he comments on the episodes assigned for this week trying to explain their main characteristics and correspondence with part one. Doubting is common in Part II of the Quixote, suggesting that the characters meet with themselves to find meaning and identity. The lecture ends with the comments on one of Cervantes’ Exemplary Stories, “The Glass Graduate.“