16. Don Quixote, Part II: Chapters XII-XXI (cont.)

Cervantes' Don Quixote (SPAN 300)

The loose format of the Quixote allows for the incorporation of different stories and texts, such as the Camacho's wedding, which was going to be a play. The episode, a form of epithalamium based on the myth of Pyramus and Thisbe, states one of the main themes of part two, that art corrects nature. As a way of turning deceit, which would normally lead to disillusionment, into a happy ending, in Camacho's wedding episode art helps nature to attain good ending. González Echevarría claims that in this episode there is a subtext in which marriage is not only a legal institution but also a transcendental metamorphosis of matter, or transubstantiation. The literal blending of bloods that makes marriage indivisible is echoed here through what González Echevarría calls 'the itinerary of blood.' In the interpretation of the myth Cervantes resembles Velázquez in that they both show the inner recesses of representation: they show creation as a layered process that ultimately involves the real.

00:00 - Chapter 1. Major Themes in Camacho's Wedding
05:40 - Chapter 2. Pyramus and Thisbe; Art Corrects Nature
21:08 - Chapter 3. Marriage as Transubstantiation; The Itinerary of Blood
39:21 - Chapter 4. Cervantes and Velázquez: Creation as a Layered Process

Complete course materials are available at the Open Yale Courses website: http://open.yale.edu/courses

This course was recorded in Fall 2009.

Category:

Education

Tags:

• theater
• abundance
• epithalamium
• art
• artificial
• nature
• marriage
• sacrament
• transubstantiation
• itinerary of blood