Fall 2015
SPAN 3700: SELECTED READINGS. SPANISH LITERATURE IN TRANSLATION.
CERVANTES’ DON QUIXOTE
Prof. Julio Baena
Office: McKenna 24
Office hours: Mondays 10-12; Wednesdays 1-3, and by appointment
e-mail address: [email protected]
Syllabus
Don Quixote de la Mancha is one of the most important books ever written. No literary critic in
the world, or cultural critic, or even philosopher fails to mention it, to analyze it to interpret it. It
has been influential to thinkers from Lukács to Foucault to Bakhtin to Girard to the Frankfurt
School, and to writers from Sterne to Nabokov to Borges to Flaubert. No other book in the
world, except for the Bible, has been translated to more languages, or undergone more editions
and reprints, or generated so many books and articles about it. It is, of course, a novel, the first
modern novel according to most critics, a herald of modernity, but it is also a book that
scrutinizes the human psyche, the nature of empire and domination, the reality of the real, or the
way in which it is reality that imitates fiction as much as the other way around.
The purpose of this course is to read and comment this one book. Or it can be argued that
it is two books, because Cervantes published Part I in 1605, and Part II in 1615… or it can be
argued that it is three books, because a “fake” Don Quixote was published in 1614, which
Cervantes incorporates in a brilliant intertextual exercise, or it can even be argued—following
Borges—that we are dealing with an unlimited number of Don Quixotes.
Don Quixote is a book about many things: idealism/realism; humor/seriousness;
modernity/middle ages, etc. But it is always a book about books. Everything in it is mediated by
several layers of reading/writing, so that the very nature of reading/writing constitutes its main
issue. Modernity, thus, gives way to post-modernity from its very start, and that is why this book
continues to be one of the most important ever written, in any language, in any era.
The course will read a number of chapters of Don Quixote each week, focusing on a
theme, for which auxiliary bibliography will be provided and required to read.
Texts
A number of good translations of Don Quixote exist. We will use the English translation by
Tom Lathrop, Signet Classics (ISBN 978-0451-53181-0) (it is designed specifically for
American students, and it is not expensive). For students in the class who can read Spanish, it is
recommended that they have a Spanish edition at hand, in order to savor the original prose by
Cervantes. A good Spanish edition can be also the Spanish edition by Tom Lathrop.
Auxiliary or complementary readings
Selected texts on criticism about Don Quixote in relation to important issues of general
cultural significance are recommended for each week’s chapters of DQ. They will be commented
upon briefly. However, these are among the texts that students will use for their final papers—
depending on each student’s topic—. The bibliography about DQ is so vast that it is nearly
impossible to handle. Students will be required to come to the teaching assistants’ or professor’s
office to discuss how to look for bibliography according to the specific topics of their final
papers, and for any other special reading need. I have selected a list that puts in perspective the
importance of Don Quixote and the issues associated to it for world-wide readers, not necessarily
specializing in literature or majoring in Spanish. The complementary readings from which we
will be commenting as the course progresses come from this list:
Allen, John Jay: Don Quixote, Hero or Fool?
Althusser, Louis “Ideology and Ideological State Apparatusses.”
Bakhtin, Mikhail: The Dialogic Imaginaton
Borges, Jorge Luis: Pierre Ménard, Author of Don Quixote
Burningham, Bruce: Tilting Cervantes
Cascardi, Anthony: Ideologies of History in Spanish Golden Age
---. (ed.) The Cambridge Companion to Don Quixote
Childers, William: Transnational Cervantes
Close, Anthony: A Companion to Don Quixote
De Armas, Frederick: Don Quixote and the Saracens
Dudley, Edward: The Endless Text
Egginton, William: The Theater of Truth
El Saffar, Ruth: Distance and Control in Don Quixote
---. Beyond Fiction: The Recovery of the Feminine in the Long Novels by Cervantes
El Saffar, Ruth, and Diana De Armas Wilson: Quixotic Desire
Foucault, Michel: The Order of Things (especially Intro and Chapter 1)
---. “What is an Author?”
Fuchs, Barbara: Passing for Spain
Garcés, María Antonia: Cervantes in Algiers
Gerli, Michael: Refiguring Authority
Girard, René: Deceit, Desire, and the Novel (Especially Intro and Chapter I)
Hitchcock, R. “Cervantes, Ricote, and the Expulsion of the Moriscos
Iser, Wolfgang: “The Repertoire.”
Johnson, Carroll B. Cervantes and the Material World
Kundera, Milan: The Art of the Novel.
Lacan, Jacques: “The Mirror Stage.”
Lukács, Georg: Theory of the Novel
Maravall, José Antonio: The Culture of the Baroque
---. Utopia and Counterutopia in Don Quixote
Murillo, Luis Andres: The Golden Dial
Parr, James: Don Quixote: Anatomy of a Subversive Discourse
Riley, Edward C. Cervantes’ Theory of the Novel
Unamuno, Miguel de: Our Lord Don Quixote
Methodology:
Monday and Wednesday: Professor’s lectures
Monday or Tuesday: Recitation sessions. These sessions are mandatory, and will constitute
most of the participation grade
During lectures, the professor will explain, analyze, and contextualize the chapters assigned for
the day. There will be a 5-minute quiz almost every week (12 quizzes total) destined to test
reading comprehension and to make sure that the students are reading the text closely and
carefully. Also in each lecture class, questions will be distributed to students for them to answer
and discuss their answers during recitation sessions. Most of the grade for participation will
come from the recitation discussions.
Recitation sessions are conducted by Teaching Assistants. Students will discuss the questions
distributed in advance by the professor, will get a feedback on their quizzes, and answer to a
brief written question in the last 5 to 10 minutes. If there is time, they can also discuss their final
paper projects, but it is recommended that the discussion of each individual project takes place
with the professor or the TA during office hours or time set for such discussions, out of class.
Attendance: Two absences in lecture and one in recitation are allowed without penalty. Beyond
that, 3 points per unexcused absence will be deducted from the final grade. Excused absences are
those related to illness (medical note needed), sports participation (note also needed), or any
other justifiable reason (proof needed).
Final Essay: students must write a 10-page final essay (double-spaced, Times Roman font 12 or
equivalent). 10 pages is a minimum, and it is recommended that students plan for 15 pages. The
essay must choose a specific topic on Don Quixote, with depth and analysis being preferable to
width and synthesis. A minimum of 5 bibliographical auxiliary sources must be chosen and used.
Students must be able to articulate literary concepts, present a coherent and logical argument,
close-read the primary text, and relate it to the theoretical issues explained during the course.
A first draft of the essay is due two weeks before the deadline.
Grade distribution
2 partial or midterm exams (one take-home, and one in-class). 15% each for 30%
Final exam
20%
Final essay
20%
Weekly quizzes
10%
Grade for answers to questions for recitation
10%
Class participation
10%
CALENDAR
Week 1
Complementary readings for weeks 1 and 2:
Gerli: Refiguring Authority (Intro).
Barthes: “The Death of the Author”
Foucault: The Order of Things (Intro and Ch. 1)
Dudley: The Endless Text (Conclusions)
Mon. Aug, 24
Brief introduction to the course.
The Prologue to Don Quixote Part I.
Chapters 1-3
Topics: The borders of a text: a meta-prologue
A writer who reads; a hidalgo who reads. Bad data.
Prostitutes become princesses.
Questions to answer and discuss in next recitation:
--“Idle reader.” How does Cervantes relate the reader to the protagonist?
--Whose activities and problems does the reader find before finding those of the
Protagonist?
--Is Don Quixote unique in the way he perceives a mediated reality?
--What were Chivalry Romances? How do they compare to our own “cheap”
entertainment?
Aug 24 and 25
Recitation
Quiz #1
Chapters 4 to 8
Topics: Andrés’ adventure: how (not) to be a super-hero
“I know who I am” (modern subjectivity)
DQ’s library; books to keep or to burn
Sancho’s introduction
Windmills/giants.
The author runs out of text.
Questions to answer and discuss in next recitation:
--Andrés’ adventure: idealism and reality (the dialectics of good deeds)
--The merchants: blind faith and money
--What is D Q’s second favorite literary genre?
--How is the burning of books related to Spain’s reality in the 1600’s?
Wed. Aug 26
Week 2
Complementary readings for weeks 2 and 3:
El Saffar and Wilson: Quixotic Desire
El Saffar: Distance and Control in Don Quixote
Mon. Aug 31
Chapters 9 to 14
Topics: Fragments and versions. Cide Hamete Benengeli
The myth of the Golden Age (of goats and sheep)
First love story: Marcela. A pastoral-cum-suicide
Questions to answer and discuss in next recitation:
--After an abrupt interruption, how many more voices are added to the telling of the
story, and how reliable are they?
--The pros and cons of fragments in narrative
--Marcela: she is free (but she is also narcissistic).
Aug 31 and Sep 1
Wed. Sep 2
Recitation
Quiz #2
Chapters 15 to 19
Topics: Desire, lust, and darkness at the inn:
Medicines to cure or kill
Sancho’s body as a “credit card”
Reality and perception (in a dust cloud or in a dark night)
Questions to answer and discuss today or in next recitation:
--The first interpolated story is a pastoral one. How does desire and lust work in it, in
Rocinantes’ adventure with the mares, and in Maritornes’ episode?
--Perception and reality. How physical things (dust or darkness) or psychological
processes (fear, etc.) condition them.
Week 3
Mon. Sep 7 Labor Day. No classes
The recitations of Mon Sep 7 are cancelled. Let us cancel the one on Tue Sep 8. Feel welcome to
come to the office hours of the instructor or the TA’s
Wed. Sep 9
Chapters 20 to 22
Topics: The very strange dark night of the fulling-mills
Sancho Panza’s Scherezadesque story
Mambrino’s magic helmet. Hidden serendipity
DQ frees the convicts. Freedom as an absolute
Week 4
Complementary readings for Week 4:
Lukács: Theory of the Novel
Mon. Sep 14. Quiz #3
Chapters 23 to 29
Topics: the Sierra as a different chronotope (a labyrinth).
Things lost in the Sierra: Cardenio’s mind, Sancho’s donkey, etc.
Letters, poems, IOUs. DQ imitates a madman.
Cross-dressing and cross-bearding (from the Priest to Dorotea;
from tail to beard)
Questions to answer and discuss in next recitation:
--How is reality perceived: the divergent role of all the senses. The smell of fear. The
sound of thirst
--DQ’s idea of freedom vs. the law. DQ’s “outness” (out of his mind, outlaw,
excommunicated, etc.)
--How is Sierra Morena a labyrinth (both geographical and textual), and how is this
related to Cardenio’s story and DQ’s evolution?
Sep 14 and 15 Recitations
Wed. Sep 16 Quiz #4
Chapters 30-36
Topics: DQ, Sancho, and the never seen Dulcinea
Andrés is back
Palomeque’s inn: an axis mundi (like the magic palace in La
Diana)
Dorotea’s/Micomicona’s story: a giant’s head/ wineskin
The Tale of Inappropriate Curiosity: mimetic desire
Week 5
Complementary readings for Week 5:
Girard: Deceit, Desire, and the Novel
Riley: Cervantes’ Theory of the Novel
Mon. Sep 21. Chapters 37-45
Topics: To have dinner twice. Hegel and History
The Captive’s Tale. Of Moors, Christians, and forgiveness
The never-ending quarrel over Mambrino’s helmet (the neverending quality of desire)
Questions for next recitation:
--Discuss the four “interpolated” love stories (Cardenio. Dorotea, Curious, and Captive),
and their function in the novel (actually: as the very center of the novel)
Sep 21 and 22 Recitations
Wed, Sep 23 Questions for Exam #1 (take-home) will be handed in
Chapters 46-52
Topics: Out/in. Law and castration (an oxen-driven cage)
The dialogs between DQ and Sancho. Their contrasts
(orality/literacy; practicality/idealism; greed/ethics, etc.
The Canon of Toledo: Cervantes’ theory of the novel
Sancho and his multi-named wife
A strange sequel in a lead box (written centuries before it
happened)
Week 6
Complementary readings for Weeks 6 and 7:
Iser: “The Repertoire.”
Lacan: “The Mirror Stage.”
Mon. Sep 28 Quiz #5
Don Quixote Part II, Prologue and Chapter 1.
Topics: The “false” Quixote by Avellaneda
The obvious and the hidden in the Prologue: the
(mis)appropriation of Avellaneda and the reader’s expectations
Jokes about madmen outside and inside the text
Questions to answer and discuss today and in next recitation:
--How is the Prologue to Part II both about Avellaneda and about readers’ expectations?
--How is DQ “pushed” to be DQ (how is everyone but him interested in that)?
--Discuss the jokes about madmen
Sep 28 and 29 Recitations
Wed. Sep 30 EXAM #1 DUE
Chapters 2-4
Topics: “What do they think of me?” DQI as intertext of DQII.
Identity as a product of a “mirror.”
Week 7
Complementary readings for Weeks 7 and 8:
El Saffar-Wilson: Quixotic Desire
Mon. Oct 5
Chapters 5-7
Topics: Sancho and Teresa Panza. Sancho’s “Quixotization.”
Medieval gift vs. modern salary. Sancho’s failed strike
A new character—or nemesis(?)—: Bachelor of Arts Carrasco
Questions to answer and discuss in next recitation:
--“What do they think of me?” DQI (the book) as a (Lacanian) mirror to DQ the character
--The modern age (of mercantilism/capitalism) vs. the old age. DQ as a “nostalgic.”
--Is there a job for knights (what makes a knight a knight)
Oct. 5 and 6
Recitations
Wed. Oct 7
Chapters 8-10
Topics: A mandatory trip to El Toboso to find (i.e: make-up) a Dulcinea
He-donkeys or she-donkeys. The elusive nature of the object of
Desire
Sancho’s (and DQ’s) web of fabrications
Week 8
Complementary readings for Weeks 8 and 9:
Egginton: The Theater of Truth
Bakhtin: The Dialogic Imagination
Mon. Oct. 12 Quiz #6
Chapters 11-17
Topics: The itinerant masquerade of Death
Another mirror: the Knight of Mirrors
Another mirror: the Knight of the Green Coat and the adventure
of the lions: from ”I know who I am: to “I am not that,”
Questions to answer and discuss today and in next recitation:
--What is Dulcinea del Toboso?
--Follow the web of lies and fabrications that started in Sierra Morena
--Mirrors of DQ, and how he identifies or refuses to identify.
Oct 12 and 13 Recitations
Wed Oct 14
Quiz #7
Chapters 18-21
Topics: More literary genres
The Pantagruelian wedding feast of Camacho
Week 9
Mon. Oct. 19 Chapters 22-25
Topics: The symbolism of the Cave of Montesinos.
The web of fabrications continues: “And I’ll say no more.”
How to create a linguistic system (and a war): the braying rivals
Questions to answer and discuss in next recitation:
--The cave of Montesinos: lies, dreams, divides…
--Discussion about the braying episode
Oct 19 and 20 Recitations
Wed Oct 21
Chapters 26-28
Topics: Master Pedro’s puppet show
DQ flees
Week 10
Complementary readings for Weeks 10 and 11:
Unamuno: Our Lord Don Quixote
Maravall: Utopia and Counterutopia in the Quixote
Mon. Oct. 26 Quiz #8
Chapters 29-32
Topics: The edge of land (or of Empire): the “enchanted boat.”
Dukes and servants
Idle noblemen. DQ and Sancho as private (captive) buffoons
Questions to answer and discuss in next recitation:
--Master Pedro’s puppet show and DQ’s behavior
--The enchanted boat as an allegory of the Spanish Empire
--the Duke’s palace as yet an allegory of Spain’s political system and its ruling classes
Oct 26 and 27 Recitations
Wed. Oct 28 Chapters 33-35
Topics: Masquerades.
The whipping as (inflationary) currency.
Letters, couriers, private and public matters.
Week 11
Mon. Nov 2
Quiz #9
Chapters 36-41
Topics: Again cross-dressing and cross-bearding
Clavileño, the flying horse. The web of fabrications continues
Nov 2 and 3
EXAM #2 DURING RECITATION TIME
Wed. Nov 4
Chapters 42-46
Topics: Cervantes’ political theory (Can Sancho Panza be a Governor?)
DQ’s loneliness: torn stockings
Altisidora: a paradoxical story of love/disdain
Week 12
Quiz #10
TOPIC FOR FINAL ESSAY MUST BE GIVEN
Chapters 47-49
Topics: Sancho Panza as Governor. Joke and seriousness
Doña Rodríguez’s real problems and how her only hope is DQ
The long arm of a (cruel) Empire: a generous practical joke on
Sancho’s wife and daughter (generous with someone else’s
Money)
Questions to answer and discuss today and in next recitation:
--DQ’s broken stockings: their meaning. DQ as one of the saddest stories ever told
--Doña Rodríguez’s problem as a microcosm of the problems of Spain in the 1600’s
--Sancho’s government as a model or utopia
Mon. Nov 9
Nov 9 and 10 Recitations
Wed. Nov 11 Chapters 50-53
Topics: More letters. Tosilos, the lackey
DQ and Sancho separated from each other
Week 13
Complementary readings for Week 13:
Hitchcock: “Cervantes, Ricote, and the Expulsion of the Moriscos.”
Mon. Nov 16 Quiz #11
Chapters 54 to 56
Topics: The expulsion of the Moriscos of 1609
Sancho takes half a bread and half a cheese (and much grief) from
his governorship
Ricote, the Morisco. A brotherly agape and a fall into a chasm
Questions to answer and discuss in next recitations:
--The gap between the narrator’s urge to laugh and the progressive sadness of the story
--Tosilos “sees the light.”
--How Cervantes sides on the Morisco issue. His mastery in using voices to tell the real
horror
Nov 16 and 17 Recitations
Wed. Nov 18 FIRST DRAFT OF FINAL ESSAY DUE
Discussion of final essay topics
Week of Nov 23 to Nov 27: Thanksgiving break
Week 14
Complementary readings for Weeks 14 and 15:
Borges: Pierre Ménard, Author of Don Quixote
De Armas: Don Quixote and the Saracens
Mon. Nov 30 Chapters 57 to 63
Topics: Mounted Saints to fake Arcadia (alternative occupations)
DQ finds out about Avellaneda’s book. He decides to disobey not
one but three authors
Catalan bandits. Catalans. DQ in Barcelona
Questions to answer and discuss in next recitation:
--Animals of Arcadia: from sheep to bulls to pigs
--How to disobey three authors
--The border of Catalonia as marked with dead bodies
Nov 30 and Dec 1 Recitations
Wed. Dec 2
Chapters 64-65
Topics: Defeats and the unconquerable spirit
What is this book about?
Week 15
Mon. Dec 7
Quiz #12
Chapters 66-73
Topics: Tosilos again
What to do if you are a simple “good man” who can’t be a knight
Avellaneda’s book again: can affidavits state “who you are”?
Dec 7 and 8 Recitations. Discussion about issues related to the final essays
Wed. Dec 9
The last chapter of Don Quixote Ch. 74). Different interpretations
FINAL VERSION OF FINAL ESSAY DUE
FINAL EXAM Monday, December 14, 4:30-7pm in the lecture classroom
University and Department Policies
(1) Add / Drop / Waitlist - If you are waitlisted for this class, it is IMPERATIVE that you
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http://www.colorado.edu/spanish/resources/dropadd-policy
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