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The Dorotea-Fernando/Luscinda-Cardenio Episode in Don Quijote: A Postmodernist Play

Author(s): Myriam Yvonne JehensonSource: MLN, Vol. 107, No. 2, Hispanic Issue (Mar., 1992), pp. 205-219Published by: The Johns Hopkins University Press

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The

Dorotea-Fernando/Luscinda-Cardenio

Episode

n

Don

Quijote:

A

Postmodernist

lay

Myriam

vonneJehenson

In

memory

f

my

beloved

husband,

Roger

H.

Jehenson

Fiction rticulates

heory

more

nterestingly

and

exhaustively

han

ny xplicitly

heoret-

ical

writing....

It is

the

novel

which

pro-

duces

the

theory

nd

not the

theory

which

produces

henovel.

-Ann

Jefferson,

he

Nouveau

Ro-

man

and

the oetics

f

Fiction:

.

In the

plethora

of

critical

iscourses

on modernism

nd

postmod-

ernism,

on

whether

or

not

they

are

continuous

or

discontinuous

modes,

two

nteresting

ssues

emerge.

The first

ssue is

the shift

n

emphasis

from

the

finished

work

to its

making.

The mode of

ac-

tivity,

ot

the author's

or artist's

ompleted

action,

becomes

a

pri-

mary

ssue.

A

second

issue

is whether

he

allegation

s

ustified

hat

innovative,

xperimental

uthors

subvert

fictional

norms.

Regardingthe first ssue, it is truethatthe reader of postmod-

ernist

works

s

not confronted

with n

illusory

ense

of

represen-

MLN,

107,

1992):

205-219

?

1992

by

The

JohnsHopkins

University

ress







206

MYRIAM YVONNE

JEHENSON

tation,

but

is, instead,

nvited

o

participate

n the author's action.1

For the

postmodernist

eader

or

writer,

here

s no kernelof mean-

ingtobe cracked,onlya texture factivityobe experienced n its

making.

Whereas

modernism'staste

for

authority

till

grounded

the

work

of literature nd

art in the

universal,

he

postmodernist

habit

of

thought

privileges

hange

over

necessity

nd randomness

over

preconceived

order

(Klinkowitz:7).

n The Dismemberment

f

Orpheus,

hab

Hassan

outlines

what most

postmodernist

critics

would

agree

upon

as

the radical

contrasts etween

the modernist

and

postmodernist

abitsof

mind. While modernists eek

purpose

and

totalized

meaning,

the

postmodernists

re more interested

n

play.2

The second issue

which

emerges

from

he

discourse

on

modern-

ism and

postmodernism

s the latter's

upposed

subversion

of

fic-

tional

norms

(Brooke-Rose

1981).

For

postmodernist

writers his

supposition

is

itself ndicativeof

another modernist

llusion. For

the

postmodernist

writer,

ll

novels,

experimental

nd

traditional,

can be read

as a

laboratory

f narrative

Jefferson 980:17).

In

his

biting reproach

to

postmodernists

because

of their

alleged

abandonmentof mimetic ommitments, erald Graffnevertheless

concedes that

From

he

ncient iew

hat

iterary

ictions

llustrate

eneral

ruths,

e

moved

o the

view

hat

iterary

ictionsllustrate

ictions. ut

having

n

the

meantime

iscovered

hat

eality

s itself

fiction,

e reassert

hat,

in

llustrating

ictions,

iterary

ictionseveal

ruth.

n

a

paradoxical

nd

fugitive

ay,

mimetic

heory

emains

live.Literature olds

hemirror

up

to

unreality

1979:179).

And,

as

with mimetic

theory,

n an

equally paradoxical way,

mi-

metic

anguage

also

remains alive.

In

her discussion

of the

most

radical

forms f

contemporary

iterature,

nn

Jefferson

alls

such

experimental

writing

realistic

because

it

lays

bare

the

systems

through

which we construct

eality,

ot

only

n fiction ut also in

Klinkowitz

puts

it

this

way:

To read is to discover

how a text was

written;

o

view a

painting

s to

see

how

it was

painted.

One

places

oneself within he

produc-

tion,

not

the

product,

and for this to

happen

the audience must free itself f all

inhibitions

nd

presumptions

f

meaning

5).

2

For Hassan, the modernist's tructured ense oforder is replaced bythe post-

modernist's

ocus on

the randomness

of a work n

progress

over its

static,

inished

state.

There

is no

sense of totalized

meaning

n

postmodernism

s the author nvites

us

to deconstruct

uch modernist

presumptions

nd to reveal the arbitrariness f

constraints

267-8).







M

LN

207

everyday

ife.

For

the

postmodernist

writer/reader,

ll is

condi-

tioned

by

textuality.

This foregroundingof fictionaldevices and the focus on au-

tocriticism

re

precisely

he characteristics

hat

made

Don

Quijote

the

model

par

excellence

for

Bakhtin

of what

was

unique

to

the

novel as

a

genre.

Linda

Hutcheon

goes

further

nd sees

Don

Quijote

as

the

directforbearer

f the

contemporary

metafictional

nvesti-

gations

nto

the

relation

of discourse

to

reality -reality

oth

in

its

social

and

literary/fictional

spects

(1985:72).

My

intent

n

this

paper

is to

show

thatthe Don

Quijote

s

indeed

a direct

forbearer

of

postmodernism,

not

as

a diachronic

but

a

synchronic onstruct.Before doing so, I would like to elaborate

briefly

n the

terms

diachronic,

ynchronic,

nd

construct.

use

dia-

chronic

s

the

separating

of

contiguous

tyles, enres,

onventions:

modern

versus

postmodern.

I

use

synchronic

s

relating

tempo-

rally

remote

styles, enres,

conventions

hat,

cross

history,

eveal

significant

esemblances

Calinescu

1986:247).

When

I

employ

the

term

synchronic

onstruct,

construct

s

used

deliberately.

ust

s

textual

properties

re

not

independent

of the metatextual

abel

by

which

we choose

to

designate

a

text,

so

metatextual

abels

both

designate

and,

in

naming,

actually

create heir

object

(Suleiman:

256).

As

Ihab

Hassan

points

out,

in

literary

riticism

we

always

create

a model

and

then

proceed

to 'discover'

the affinities

f

various

authors

and

different

moments

with

that model

(Hassan

1980:108).

This

is

akin to

what

Borges

does

in the

essay,

Kafka

and

His Precursors

1941).

Borges

says

bout

the Kafka-like

ist

of

precursors

he has

enumerated

n the

essay,

If

I

am

not

mistaken,

not all

of

them

resemble

each other.

The

second fact

s the

most

significant.n each of these textswe find Kafka's diosyncrasy

o

a

greater

or lesser

degree,

but

if

Kafka

had

never

written

line,

we

would

not

perceive

this

quality;

n other

words

itwould

not

exist

(Borges

1962:201).

Following

Borges,

we too

could

say

that f

the

concept

of

postmodernism

did not

exist,

however elusive

or

con-

troversial,

t would

be

impossible

to

come

up

with listof

precur-

sors,

and

that

the

authors

enumerated

do not

so much

resemble

each

other

as

they approximate

certain

common

features

which

figure

n our

constructed

odel

(Calinescu

1986:248).

Postmodernistwritings designed to raise ontologicalquestions

such as:

What

is a

world?

What

kinds

of worlds

are

there,

howare

they

constituted,

what is

the

mode of

existence

of the

world

(or

worlds)

it

projects?

How

is a

projected

world

structured

McHale







208

MYRIAM YVONNE

JEHENSON

1986:60)?

Postmodernism

eems

to be more concerned

with

hose

ontological

ssues than

withthe

epistemological

nes such as:

How

do we know?How are we getting hisknowledge, nd how do we

know

the narrator

s or is not reliable?

The latter ssues have been

traditionally rivileged by

readers

of Don

Quijote,

novel which

deals

with one

of the

greatest

of all

epistemological

doubts,

the

theme

of

Illusion/Reality.

ut what

happens

when

a

novel teeters

between

the

epistemological

nd

ontological,

when the

blurring

f

distinctions

nd

the

questioning

of authorial

reliability

s so

ubiq-

uitous

that

the

reader

cannot even

find an identifiable enter of

consciousness

hrough

which /he

may attempt

o recover he text's

inconsistencies,when intractable

pistemological

uncertainty..

becomes at a

certain

point

ontological

plurality

or

instability

(McHale

60-5)?

I

believe this to be

the

case

in Don

Quijote.

The

incident

involving

Dorotea-Fernando/Luscinda-Cardenio,

withwhich this

paper

is

concerned,

begins

in

chapter

23

of

part

I

when

Don

Quijote

entersthe Sierra

Morena;

it

has

its

denouement

in

1. 36 with he resolution

f

the

overs'

problems,

nd

it

ends with

the

prophesied

marriage

of

Don

Quijote

to Dulcinea

in 1. 46. On

the structural

evel,

intertextual nd intratextual arrative

trate-

gies

are

foregrounded

n the

novel,

calling

attention o the arbi-

trariness

nd

textuality

f a world

where,

to

quote

Verlaine,

tout

le reste est

litterature.

The

Foregrounding

of Intertextual

Repetitions

Don

Quijote's

stay

n

the

Sierra

Morena

is

explicitly

nnounced

as

imitation,parody and play. It is one of the purest examples of

performance

n

the novel.

Don

Quijote's quiero

imitar

Amadis

explicitly

efines

his

goal:

to see

himself s he is

not,

to imitate

everything

rom

the

person

he has decided

to

be,

to

play-act.

This

imitative

epetition

f intertexts

rom

Greek, medieval,

and

Bibli-

cal sources

stresses

imilarities. on

Quijote

will not

only

imitate

the

madness

of

Amadis de

Gaula,

but

of the

chivalric

Roldan,

or

Orlando,

or Rotolando.

It is

playacting nyway

nd

they

re all the

same

(25:305).

Cardenio

will

also

imitate

Orlando-malgre

lui-by

becominginsane over love. Luscinda's fatherwilldeny Cardenio

entrance nto his home as Thisbe's

parents

had done

in

the

Ovidian

rendition

of the tale

(24:293).

The

story

of

Cardenio-Luscinda-

Fernando

mirrors the account

in Herodotus of the

Gyges

and







M

L N

209

Candaules

myth

nd

is further

doubled

in the

Anselmo-Camila-

Lotario

micronarrative

elated at

the

inn

(33-35).

As

the Biblical

David took Uriah's Bathsheba, the same patternis repeated as

Fernando

now

takes Cardenio's

sola

oveja

(27:334).

In each case

the author

foregrounds

the

similarity

f his

intertextual

evices.

This

penchant

for

resemblance,

s

we

know,

s one

of the

discursive

formations

xamined

by

Foucault

in Les mots

t es

chosess the

well

known

Renaissance

focus

on

aemulatio,

focus

which,

for

Foucault,

is dominated

by

the

category

of the Same.3

In the

postmodernist

view such

a

pastiche-like

ncorporation

f traditions

esults

n an

entropic

fusion

of

forms,

onfusion

of realms

Hassan

1975:55-

58). The effects that ll differencesre thereby ancelled (Stevick

1981:138).

This assimilation

s at odds

with

the inclination

oward

discrimination

nd

qualification.

ts focus s

on the sameness

of

it

all,

the lack

of

distinction

etween

model and

copy.

For

Jean

Baudrillard,

this treasured

postmodernist

trategy

s

indicative

of

the

culture

of

the

simulacrum,

simulacrum

being

a

copy

with-

out

an

original

or a

copy

of an

original

whose

hierarchy,

ohesive-

ness,

and

privileged

position

have

simply

ollapsed

(1983).

Coming

from

the

postmodernistposition

of

nonhierarchy

nd

nonselec-

tion,

this

replication

nd

duplication

of othertexts n theDon

Qu-

ijote

oints

to

the oss of

those familiar

enses of

origination

nd

the

real

which

presuppose

faith

n the notions

of

reference

nd

pro-

duction.

Such

a

postmodernist

iew not

only

debunks

the notion

of

the

uniqueness,

singularity,

nd

hierarchical

position

of

the

origi-

nal,

but

it coalesces

the

disparate

elements,

hence

incorporating

different

imes

nd

categories

nd

thereby

lurring

distinctions.

t

is

genuinely

case

of

foregrounding

he

deija

u.

The

Foregrounding

of

Intratextual

Repetitions

and

Inconsistencies

Intratextual

repetitions

n the

Don

Quijote

lso

pinpoint

the

post-

modernist

penchant

for

ncorporating

ategories,

lurring

distinc-

tions and

foregrounding

ictional

evices.

Scenes are

manipulated

by

the master

craftsman

nd are

repeatedly

nterrupted

with ex-

pressions uch as: yal tiempo que el cura se preveniapara decirle

3

The other

two discursive

formations

or

Foucault,

as is well

known,

are the

category

f

Order

or

the Classical

Age,

and the

category

f Other

or

Modernity.







210

MYRIAM YVONNE

JEHENSON

...

le

suspendi6

una

voz...

(27:343).4

As Sancho

had warned

Don

Quijote

not to

interrupt

is

(Sancho's)

storytelling,

o

Carde-

nio now does the same and the author

foregrounds

he

repetitive

device:

Estas razones

del Roto

trujeron

la memoria

a don

Qui-

jote

el

cuento

que

le habia contado

su

escudero,

cuando no acert6

el numero

de las cabras

.

.

(24:292).

Characters

are flattened s

fictional

y pastiche-like

escriptions

hat reiterate

verbatim

what

other characters

have said about

them.

Both

Cardenio and

Dor-

otea,

for

example, equate

Fernando with las traiciones

de Vellido

y

..

los embustes

de Galalon

(28:348;

27:333).

Identical

ncidents

are repeated. Dorotea's parentsare frantic s

a

result

of her dis-

appearance,

as are

Luscinda's and

for the same reason

(28:357).

The

balm

of Fierabras

was coveted

by

Don

Quijote

because of

its

curative

element,

so

the barber's

new

balm

can ensure

que

su

virtud a mas

que pegar

barbas se debia

de

estender,

pues

estaba

claro

que

la

carne

llagada

y

maltrecha,

y

que,

pues

todo lo

sanaba,

a mas

que

barbas

aprovechaba

(29:369).

The

doubling

of characters

results n a mirror ffect

which

also

undermines

distinction nd

singularity.

he

innkeeper's

resem-

blance to Don Quijote in his naivebelief n chivalry, orexample,

is

pointed

out

by

Dorotea:

Poco le falta a nuestro

huesped para

hacer la

segunda parte

de don

Quijote

(396).

The

priest pleads

with the

innkeeper, que

no

cojeeis

del

pie

que

cojea

vuestro

huesped

don

Quijote

(32:398).

Dorotea's

story

tself

constitutes

another

form of

doubling.

Just

as

a Girardian

triangle

binds

Anselmo-Camila-Lotario,

o

triangular

desire makes Dorotea an-

other

Camila

and Cardenio

and Fernando another

Anselmo and

Lotario.

Themes becomerepetitive. ne ofthese s thevoyeurmotif. he

women are

prizes (prendas)

and become

dismembered

by

the

male

gaze.

Luscinda

is

dismembered

by

Fernando's

spying

upon

a

doncella

de

tantas

buenas

partes

adornada

(24:296);

and Camila

is dismembered

by

Lotario who tenia

luger

de

contemplar parte

por parte,

todos los estremos

de bondad

y

de hermosura

que

Cam-

ila tenia..

.

(33:417).

In

a

slightly

ifferent

way,

Dorotea too is

4El ingenioso idalgo on Quijote e la Mancha,1,3rd ed. Ed. Luis Andres Murillo

(Madrid:

Clasicos

Castalia,

1985),

1:

25,305.

All references

o

Don

Quijote

will be

from

this edition and

will

be cited

in

parentheses

n the text

by

chapter

and

page

number.







M

L

N

211

objectified

by

the

male

gaze

as she

washes

her feetin the water

(238:345).5

Repetitions f descuidos pointtothesamekindof arbitrariness

in a

world where

contradictions re

incorporated,

where distinc-

tions

are

fused,

where

coincidences

are

part

and

parcel

of the

world

projected.

Dorotea recounts

exactly

what

has

happened

in

her

bedroom the

night

she marries

Fernando

and the

promises

he

has

made to her.

No mention

s

made

of

a

pre-nuptial

written

pledge

of

marriage.

Yet when she

confronts

Fernando she sud-

denly

produces

the

signed pre-nuptial

ledge

(36:451).

Cardenio

is

recognized

by

Luscinda

and Fernando

in the inn

(36:449).

A

few

pages later, however,he is still ncognitoand safeguardinghis

identity:

se habia

puesto porque

no le conociese

(36:452).

Car-

denio

says

that Luscinda's

mother

unlaced

her

daughter's

dress

to

give

her

air,

whereupon

the letter

was discovered

1.

27).

In

1.

28,

Dorotea,

basing

herself

n a

stranger's

ccount,

reports

hat

t

was

Fernando

who had

unlaced Luscinda's

dress to

give

her air.6

Of

more

consequence

are incidents

wherein

diametrically

pposed

meanings

are

given

to the same word

and the text remains unaf-

fected.

Cardenio

is

convinced

thatLuscinda isunawareof

Fernan-

do's double

dealing.

And,

as Luis Murillo has

pointed

out,

he uses

the

word

segura

not to mean sure

but

to mean

unsure,

un-

aware,

ajena,

descuidada :7

Ella

me

dijo,

tan

segura

como

yo

de

la traici6n

de

don Fernando

que

procurase

volver

presto,

porque

creia

que

no

tardaria

mas la

conclusi6nde nuestras vol-

untades

que

tardase

mi

padre

de

hablar al

suyo

(27:334).

A

few

chapters

ater

the

word

segura

is

used

with

ts

accepted meaning

of

sure. Dorotea

asks Cardenio

to be

open

with

her,

for she

is

segura de que, a su parecer ninguno [desastre]podia llegar. ..

(28:352).

Traditionally eparate

categories

become blurred

n

the

episode,

thereby ontinuing

he destabilization

f distinctions.

his is

espe-

cially

rue of

binary

ppositions

n

chapters

25-27.

The

blurring

f

the

High

Culture/Low

ulture

opposition,

o well-known

hrough-

out

part

II,

also occurs

in

chapter

31

as

Don

Quijote

becomes

5

See

Salvador

J. Fajardo,

Unveiling

Dorotea

or the Reader

as

Voyeur.

Cer-

vantes, (1984), 89-108.

6

See

John

G.

Weiger,

n the

Marginsof

Cervantes. ondon:

UP of New

England,

1986,

6.

7

El

ingenioso idalgo

Don

Quijote

e

la

Mancha,

334

note

17.







212

MYRIAM

YVONNE

JEHENSON

eloquent

in

his use of

popular,

proverbs.

His Sancho-like

folk

wis-

dom is

uxtaposed

to

Sancho's

growing

rudition.

Another

exam-

ple

is the

Lofty/Erotic

inary pposition.Whilewaxingeloquenton

the

lofty

remise

..

.,por

lo

que

yo

quiero

a Dulcinea

del

Toboso

tanto

vale

como la

mas alta

princesa

de la tierra

25:313),

Don

Quijote

juxtaposes

the

salacious

tale

of the widow's sexual

use

of

the

mozo

motil6n,

and

Cervantes

makes the

uxtaposition

lin-

guistically

imilar:

para

lo

que

yo

lo

quiero,

tanta filosofia

abe,

y

mas

que

Aristoteles

25:313).

By foregrounding

hese

oppositions

as

equipresent

and

equivalent,

Cervantes

blurs

distinctions,

esta-

bilizes

his

projected world,

and

calls attention

to its

ontological

structure

where

all is

conditioned

by

textuality.

As Don

Quijote

explains:

Piensas

tu

[que]

fueron

verdaderamente

amas

de carne

y

hueso

...

No,

por

cierto,

sino

que

las

mas se las

fingen

[los

autores]

por

dar

sujeto

a

sus

versos...

(25:313-4).

As he

blurs

traditionally

eparate

categories,

o

does Cervantes

blur the con-

ventional

binary

oppositions

of

Fact/Fiction

nd

of Ludic/Serious.

For

example,

Cardenio

does

not defend

the real

Luscinda

(27:337),

but does

get

intoa violent

fight

ver

the fictional

Queen

Madasima whom,accordingto Clemencin,both Don Quijote and

Cardenio

have

probably

confused

with

the infantaGrasinda

any-

way

(24:296).8

And

the

ubiquitous

blurring

f

opposites

becomes

more

sophisticated

n the

coalescing

of Ludic/Serious

n the Dor-

otea-Micomicona

permutation.

Dorotea's

role is

in

reality

he

play-

ful role she

assumes,

that

of damsel

in

distress,

f doncella

me-

nesterosa

(29:362).

Don

Fernando

has stolen

her

kingdom

and

the reader

is

cognizant

of

the double

meaning

as

Queen

Micomi-

cona asks

Don

Quijote

for

venganza

de

un traidor

que,

contra

todo derecho divino y humano, me tiene usurpado mi reino

(29:365).

She asks

Don

Quijote que

le

desfaga

un tuerto

agravio

que

un mal

gigante

[me]

tiene fecho

(29:362).

The

blurring

of

Ludic/Serious

s

foregrounded

as

Sancho bemoans

later that la

linda

princesa

Micomicona

se habia

vuelto en

Dorotea,

y

el

gigante

en don

Fernando...

(36:456).

The

ultimate

ncorporation

nd

assimilation

f

the udic and

the serious

s to be found n Dorotea's

public

avowal

to Don

Quijote

that

by

his

participation

n her make-

believe

world

he has

actually

rectified

he

real

world:

Si

por

vos,

sefior,no fuera, amas acertara a tener a venturaque tengo; yen

8

El

ingenioso

idalgo

Don

Quijote

de la

Mancha,

298

note 17.







M L

N

213

esto

digo

tanta verdad

como son buenos

testigos

ella los mas

des-

tos sefiores

ue

estan

presentes

37:460).

The ludic interchange etween micronarrativend macronarra-

tive

strikes t the heart

of the

ontological

ssues raised

in

the

Don

Quijote.

t becomes the source of

the

characters'

metafictional n-

vestigations

nto the relation of discourse

to

reality.

n what does

reality

consist?

The

innkeeper

insists that

his

favorite chivalric

novel

is not

fantasy

but truth

because

it has become textual:

estando

impreso

con licencia de los sefiores

el

Consejo

Real...

(397).

The

ontological

question

of what constitutes ealism nd

the

real

becomes

more

problematic

n the

priest's

reaction to the

fic-

tionaltextof El curioso

mpertinente.

he fabricatedfromboth con-

structed nd

lying)

realism of

the textof El curioso

mpertinente

s

questioned

because

it

lacks

the

appropriate

semiotic codes. The

story

would

be

plausible,

the

priest says,

f it

were about a man

testing

his lover and

not about a man

testing

his wife. The

story

lacks verisimilitude.

ut verisimilitude nd

fantasy

re,

first

f

all,

both

conventional

fictional onstructs

from

ingo,

o

shape

or

form),9

nd

secondly,

the fictional ext of

El curioso

mpertinente

s

deemed

fantastic

y

the same

priest

who fails

o see the

boundaries

of

fact/fiction

iolated

before

his

very eyes.

The fictiveAnselmo-

Camila-Lotario

text

s doubled in the real

characters f

Cardenio-

Luscinda-Fernando.

Luscinda

is

Cardenio's

wifeand she has been

similarly

ested

by

Cardenio

and Fernando.10

In the

midstof all

this

repetition

nd

blurring, ny

conventional

sense

of

distinction, ohesiveness,

nd

meaning

seems irrelevant.

The

ludic world of

Don

Quijote

ascinates nd

defies

categorization.

It

simply

s.

It becomes a

performance

wherein

anything

an

hap-

pen. This performancereaches its climax at the inn. Cervantes

unites

the characters

f the Dorotea-Fernando/Luscinda-Cardenio

9

See Diana

Wilson, 1987;

Tzvetan Todorov on

verisimilitude, 0-7;

and Barbara

Foley

on

mimesis nd

the

problem

of

assertion,

2-63.

10

t

is

actually

when Cardenio

displays

Luscinda's

body

to Fernando thatFernan-

do's desire

for her is aroused: ...

mis alabanzas movieron en

1l

los deseos

de

querer

ver doncella

de tantasbuenas

partes

dornada.

Cumpliselos yo,

... ensefinn-

dosela una

noche,

a la luz

de una vela... vi6la en

sayo,

tal,

que

todas

las bellezas

hasta entonces

por

l1

istas as

puso

en olvido.

Enmudeci6,

perdi6

el

sentido,

ued6

absorto... (24:296). The fact that Luscinda and Cardenio consider themselves

husband

and wife

is twice reiterated-once

by

Cardenio

(27:341)

and

again

in

Luscinda's

letter: ...

ella no

podia

ser

esposa

de don Fernando

porque

lo era de

Cardenio...

(28:356).







214

MYRIAM YVONNE

JEHENSON

incident

nd

heightens

he

blurring

f distinctions

nd of

opposites

throughdisguise

and

crossdressing.

he

foregrounding

ffiction-

alitynow becomes explicit as an intrusiveauthor informsthe

reader

that here

will

lso

be a

blurring

f

narratives,

hat here

will

be

no

privileging

f the masternarratives

ver themicronarratives:

los cuentos

y episodios

della,

.

.. no

son

menos

agradables

y

arti-

ficiosos

y

verdaderos

que

la

misma historia.

..

(28:344).

Already

familiar

with

he

novel's

violation

f worldboundaries

as

real

historical

figures

re

juxtaposed

with

fictional

nes

through-

out the

novel,11

he reader

begins

to

query

the mode of

existence

of

the

text,

how its

projected

world is structured.The

Dorotea-

Fernando/Luscinda-Cardenio

pisode

has all theelementsof what

Benamou

and

Carmello call

the

postmodernist

enchant

for

spec-

tacle and

performance

1977)12

as well

as what Fokkema

describes

as the

postmodernist

ocus on forces

that

manipulate

and

deter-

mine

characters

from the outside

(1986).

This focus seeks

to

un-

dermine

such modernist

notions as

autonomy, integrity,

nd

choice,

and

to

foreground

world

where characters

re

systemat-

ically

manipulated

by

external

forces

1986).

In Don Quijote hismanipulation akes theform f issues ofclass,

gender,

and

the honor

code. The

episode begins

to be

seen

as

existing

on

the

boundary

between

literature and

life,

denying

frames

and

footlights.

he characterscross-dress

31:388).

They

are masked.

Their make-believe

dentities

urnout to be authentic

ones,

authentic

ones

turn out to be

mere theatrical

postures.

For-

tuitous coincidences

and

the

gathering

f

couples

in

love deliber-

ately

duplicate

the

pastoral

novel,

the sentimental

novel,

and are

reminiscent

f the comedia.

Not

only

does the

ubiquitous

sense

of

deja vu seem to regulate narrativesituations, ut the characters'

world seems

determined

by

forces

outside of

their

control.

This

control

is

subtly

couched

in the form of

a benevolent Stoic-

Christian

notion of

Providence.13

The

characters'

ndividual

mis-

ery

s vindicated

n

terms

imilar

o Alexander

Pope's

Essay

on Man

To

give

but three

examples

of Cervantes'

violationof Fact/Fiction oundaries

in

the

Quijote,

ee

1:6:120-1,

1:32:394-5,

1:36:446.

12

For Steven

Conner

the theatrical s taken

up

by

theorists f the

postmodern

as

a positiverefusalof the frozen bstraction fthe dea of the work-in-itselfnfavour

of

the idea

of the

work-in-process

134).

13

For a discussion

of Providence

n

Don

Quijote,

ee

John J.

Allen,

Don

Quixote:

Hero

or

Fool,

Part

I,

(Gainesville:

U of

Florida

P,

1979).







M

L

N

215

where

All

discord

[is]

harmony

not

understood;

all

partial

evil,

universal

good

(11.

91-2).

But

expressions

uch

as

que

el cielo nos

restituya... (29:360), que nos tuviese el cielo guardado...

(29:360),

barely

cover the determinism

rought

bout

by

ssues of

class

and honor to

which

the

characters re

subjected.14

The women in Don

Quijote

re controlled

by

the

requirements

f

a

good

reputation,

he

expectations

f a

good marriage,

nd their

own

naivete-the

latter

resulting

from

their sheltered

education.

The

men are controlled

by

the code

of

honor.

Both

women and

men are controlled

by

the

constraints

f class.

Cardenio,

for

exam-

ple,

is

angry

with

he traicionera

uscinda,

but

admitsthat

he

is

a victim f her upbringing: No era muchoque una doncella rec-

ogida

en

casa

de

sus

padres,

hecha

y

acostumbrada

siempre

a obe-

decerlos,

hubiera

querido

condecender

con su

gusto

. .

(27:341).

For

her

to

object,

he

realizes,

s

for her to

contradicther

parents

and

to

bring

dishonor to the

family.

he is then deemed

either

insane

or unchaste:

a

no

querer

recebirle,

e

podia pensar,

o

que

no

tenia

uicio,

o

que

en otra

parte

tenia

la

voluntad,

cosa

que

redundaba tan

en

perjuicio

de su buena

opinion y

fama

(27:341).

Luscinda

herself admits that she

must

marry

the

man she finds

odious:

y

que sihabia dado el si a don Fernando,fue

por

no salir

de la obediencia

de sus

padres

(28:356).

The

otherwise

feisty

Dorotea

is

doubly

controlled. She

admits

that

her

sexual downfall

s the

result

f her sheltered

raining:

Yo,

pobrecilla,

sola

entre

os

mios,

mal

ejercitada

en casos

somejantes,

comence

no se en

que

modo,

a

tener

por

verdaderas

tantas

falsedades

. .

(28:351).

She cannot

even

put

a

stop

to

Fernando's

amorous attentions

ecause he

belongs

to a

superior

class. Her

only

alternative

s to

marry omeone,

whether r not she is

prepared

to

do

so,

and

her

parents

advise

her that

.

.. si

yo

quisiese

poner

en

alguna

manera

algun

inconveniente

para

que

el

se

dejase

de su

injusta

pretensi6n, ue

ellos me casarian

luego

con

quien

yo

mas

gustase;

asi

de los mas

principales

de

nuestro

ugar

como de

todos

los

circunvecinos

.

.

(28:350).

But

a mediated

and

more

danger-

14

See

Jean-Michel

Lasperas'

La

nouvelle

n

Espagne

au

Siecled'Or

[Universite

de

Montpellier]:

Editions du

Castillet,

1987,

447.

Lasperas,

with

whom

I

do not

agree,

believes

that Cervantes nternalizes he

equation

of

moral values

with

he

values

of

the dominant class: Cervantes a ouvert

triomphalement

a voie au

genre

en Es-

pagne,

mais ce

dernier

quelques exceptions

pres,

ne s'est-il

as

ferme

deologique-

ment..

.?







216

MYRIAM YVONNE

JEHENSON

ous desire also

occasions

Dorotea's

sexual downfall.At the crucial

moment

she is seduced

(raped?)

not

only by

Don Fernando

but

by

her own social desire:

'...

y

me

dije

a mi

misma:-'Si,

que

nosere

yo

a

primera

ue

por

viade

matrimonio

aya

subido de

humilde

grande

estado,

ni

sera

don

Fernando

l

primero

quien

hermosura,

ciega

fici6n,

ue

es lo mas

cierto,

aya

hecho

tomar

ompafniaesigual

su

grandeza'

28:353).

Even

the

fictional

amila

of El curioso

mpertinente

s

caught

n the

dilemma

that

regulates

the real word of Cervantes'

novel. When

she

tries o extricate

herselffrom

he

occasion

of

possible

dishonor

she finds herselfbound to another'swill: Anselmo le

replic6

que

aquel

era

su

gusto,

y

que

no

tenia

mas

que

hacer

que

bajar

la cabeza

y

obedecelle

(33:417).

Worried about

dishonoring

herself nd her

husband,

she

may

not

turn

to

her

parents

for

hat

would

be

contra

el

mandamiento

de su

esposo

(34:419);

if she

stays

n her home

and

allows Lotario

to

visit,

corria

peligro

su honestidad

34:419).

In

both cases

she is controlled

by

forces

beyond

her

will. n

fact,

he

entire

tightly-knit

cript

Anselmo

crafts

ncodes the charactersof

El curiosompertinenteithin hetragicnormsofperipateia, amartia,

and

anagnorisis.

he

drama

begins

with

he account of

the

oyalty

f

the two

friends nd the

happy marriage

of Anselmo

and

Camila.

It

ends

as

the

unhappy

Anselmo

is

left bereft

of

wife,

friends,

er-

vants,honor,

and

life tself

35:444).

Anselmo's

tragic

lawhas been

his

hubris

n

testing

woman's

virtue,

hereby ttempting

o

make

his wife nto a

precious

commodity, jewel,

who,

as

in

Hawthorne's

The Birth

Mark,

must

shine

perfectly

or

him.

Anselmo's terrible

anagnorisis

ies

n

his realization

hat

he has

plotted

his

own

tragedy,

that t is he who is el fabricadorde mi deshonra (445). All this

may

be mere

storytelling,et

he fictionalworld tself s destabilized

by

the violation

of world

boundaries-the

confusion

of

playacting

with he

real. Cervantes

changes

conventionalnotionsof realism

or reference

by

confronting

he discourse of fictionwith the dis-

course of historical

reality.

The

artificer,

he

craftsman

f the

charade,

witnesseshis

artifice

aking

on

a life of its

own: Atenti-

simo

habia

estado Anselmo

... a ver

representar

a

tragedia

de

la

muerte

de su

honra;

la

cual

con tan estrafos

y

eficaces afectos

a

representaron los personajes della, que pareci6 que se habian

transformado n la misma

verdad de lo

que

fingian

35:436).

As in so

much

contemporary ostmodernist

iction,

micro- nd

macrocosmically,

he

characters re determined

by

externalnorms







M L N

217

and forces.

The seduced

and

abandoned

Dorotea,

the

kidnapped

and humiliated

Luscinda

whom

Fernando tries

o murder for

hav-

ingmade himlook foolish 28:356), and thebetrayedCardenio all

kneel before

the

perpetrator

f

their

suffering

nd

misery.

Dor-

otea

begs

Fernando

to

restoreher

honor,

f

not

as his wifethen

as

his slave:

'Y si no me

quierespor

la

que soy,

ue

soy

tu verdadera

y legitima

esposa,

uiereme,

lo

menos,

admiteme

or

tu esclava:

ue

como

yo

esteen

tu

poder,

me tendre

or

dichosa

y

bien fortunada'

36:451).

Cardenio

and Luscinda too se fueron

poner

de rodillas

nte

don

Fernando, dandole graciasde la mercedque les habia hecho...

(36:445).

Issues

of class

are introducedand resolved

n

a

spirit

f

play.

Even the

perpetrator,

ernando,

framed

by

forces

beyond

his

choosing,

must

play

his

part.

In love

with

Luscinda,

indifferent o

Dorotea,

he

must conform

o external

norms,

finding

himself tan

a

pique

de

perder

el credito

y

el alma.

.

(456).

He too

accepts

partial

evil

[as]

universal

good :

Y

pues

ella

[Luscinda]

allo

y

alcanz6 o

que

deseaba

y yo

he hallado

n

vos Dorotea]oquemecumple,

iva lla

segura

.

.

que rogare

l cielo

que

me os

deje

vivir onmiDorotea

36:454).15

Textually

resolved,

the

incident

nevertheless

remains

open-

ended.

One

is reminded

of William

Spanos'

view of

postmodernist

writing

s

that

which

pulverizes

losure,

activating

n the

reader

an

unending

dialogue

with

he text

1979:115).

This

openended-

ness is

reinforced

y

Cervantes'

udic

penchant

for

treating

would-

be serious

issues

playfully

nd

in a

spirit

of

entertainment.

he

characters

re

portrayed

s

pawns

of

external forces

at the

same

time that theyare primarily een as actors in a make-believe

performance.

As

with

postmodern

fiction,

tyle

here is

emphasized

over

content,

manner becomes

more

important

han content.

The

priest

may

not

be satisfied

with he

matter f El

curioso

mpertinente

but he

approves

of

its

style: por

lo

que

toca

al modo

de

contarle,

no

me descontenta

35:446).

By

the same

token,

the

matterof

Dorotea's

real

story

of

seduction

(?),

betrayal, attempted

rape,

15

JavierHerrero,whoseinterpretationiffers rommine,nevertheless escribes

the Dorotea-Fernando/Luscinda-Cardenio

episode

as determined

by

external

forces:

Lust is the

Minotaur which

transforms

ife nto a

labyrinth

..

Only

Prov-

idence,

by

transforming

im

Fernando]

from he diabolical

Minotaur

nto a Chris-

tian

knight

ould

save his victims

romtheir

doom

(68).







218

MYRIAM YVONNE

JEHENSON

abandonment,

and

desperation

becomes,

like the

Curioso,

imply

one more

example

of

textuality:

de lo

cual

gust6

tanto don

Fernando y los que con el venian, que quisieran que durara el

cuento

mas

tiempo:

tanta

era la

gracia

con

que

Dorotea contaba sus

desventuras

36:455).

In a

novel

where the

ludic strikes

t the

heart of

the

ontological

ssues

raised,

the reader

may

well

query,

with

the

postmodernist

ritic

Alan

Wilde,

whether

even

play

is

without

meaning...

(1981:172).

Cervantes,

however,

does not

focus

on

questions

of

meaning,

no

matter

how much

the

social

forces f

class,

honor,

and

patriarchy

mayhedge

in and

press

upon

his

play,

n

both

senses of

the word.

He

instead

foregrounds

he

fictionality

f the

episode,

carefully

emarcating

he

space

within

which t

takes

place.

The

question

to

be

posed

in

this

pisode

is

not

whether

play

has

meaning

but,

rather,

how

far

play

can intrude

upon

the structural

iolence

of a

society.

The

metonymical

world

within which

the Dorotea-Fernando/Luscinda-Cardenio

pisode

has taken

place

may

have been

allowed,

at

times,

to mirrorthe

tensions f

another

world,

hatof

contemporary ociety.

ervantes,

however,

makes

certainthat

the

episode

is not

identified

with

that

world.We are alwaysremindedthat heepisode revels nplay,that

it has

taken

place,

after

all,

in an inn which s but

an

enchanted

castle.

State

Universityf

New

York t

Oswego

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a posmodernity play

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