DON QUIXOTE Reality and Illusion:-

Ø   DON QUIXOTE Reality and Illusion:-

v An era of awakening in Spain:-

          The Renaissance means the enlightenment of the human mind after the darkness of the middle Ages. It denotes transition from the middle Ages to the Modern world. Man discovered himself and the universe. According to Taine,     “Man suddenly opened his eyes and saw the world around him.”

           In Medieval Age man’s mind was confused by theory and old traditions. There intellectuals of that age were giants, but they played with children’s’ toys. They knew more about the geography of heaven and hell than about the world around them. Other worldliness

was an essential part of their spiritual make-up. They did not enter the fresh fields of exploration and discovery. While in the Renaissance, the Arabs opened men’s eyes to unexplored realms of Nature. Then came the flood of Greek literature. Truth was the only authority. Men searched for truth as they sought for new lands or gold or the fountains of youth. This was the new spirit of the Renaissance.

          The sixteen century was an era of awakening in Spain also. The Moors had been driven off to African, and the Jews had been expelled. Spain was filled with a new national and patriotic spirit. It had become rich by the adventures of its explorers and the valour of its armies.

v The influence of the renaissance:-

          Cervantes was deeply under the influence of the renaissance. humanist view that the man is the creator and moulder of his own destiny. He took the world as a field for the legitimate and honorable exercise of all his faculties. He opposed the medieval view of this world as a value of tears. The works of Cervantes tell as,

“Let us accept life and makes the best of it.

Above all, let us never forget how to laugh.”

          He maintained a humane and balanced outlook even under savage religious tyranny and wretched poverty. He was the son of a barber-surgeon. His education was far form academic. He became a soldier and fought in the glorious battle of Lepanto(1571). He maimed one of his hands. He was for years a captive slave in Allegers. He had put all ambition behind him and was too old and tired to care for acclaim of the world. He took up to writing because he had one good hand yet left. How would have thought that such a man would pick up he secret life a Don Quixote  and A Sancho Panza? His life was typical of the all round activity of the men like our own Edmund Spenser. Walter Raleigh and Philip Sidney who were respective and administrator, a courtier and adventurer and a soldier yet they were the finest poets of their days.

v A story about an amusing madman:-

          Cervantes thought of literature as something that expresses ideal state and desires rather than experiences. The general opinion of that time was strongly against realism. One of the subjects that most interested him was madness. This was a taste of the time. He decided to write a story about an amusing madman who imagined himself to be knight-errant. He chose Don Quixote was ruins himself and others by his romantic and generous illusions and by his over-confidence in the goodness of human nature.

v The difference between reality and illusions:-

          “Don Quixote” begins as a burlesque of exaggerated deeds of chivalric heroes. This novel shows the difference between reality and illusions, through the adventures of Don Quixote and his Squire, Sancho Panza. The later part of this novel deals with the problem of reality and illusion. How mad is Don Quixote? Sometimes we find him out of his normal sense. At other times he is quite reasonable enough on the matters which do not tough his obsession of Knighthood. In this connection Van Doren suggests that

          “He is acting a role and he knows exactly what he is doing just as the child who plays the role of Superman…is not deceived by his own game.”

          Moreover, such acting  is not completely fruitless because it creates thing it imitates. Suppose that a man who pretends to be a poet, actually write excellence poetry; he would no longer be pretending then. This is Don Quixote’s attitude towards Knighthood. Tin this novel, he tells that Chivalry has became rare in these days, but if only men will think, feel and act like Knights; they will be Knights in fact. Thus it becomes hard to say what is fantasy and what is reality.

v The Theme of Idealism and Realism:-

          There are some readers who believe that quixotism is a comment on the irresolvable class between idealism and realism. In this novel Don Quixote tries to impose his reality upon others. For example he proposes to make Sancho Panza the Governor of an island as reward of his faithful serve to him. We know that it is almost impossible for him to offer such a reward to Sancho. But anyhow, eh gets his dream realized through the Duke who makes Sancho the Governor of a small village and de orders the people of his village to obey him. Thus Don Quixote get what he wants. Sancho also govern his island very sincerely and wisely. That way the joke is on the Duke and not on them. The final irony comes in the last Chapter. The young gentleman of his village disillusions Don Quixote. He faces Don Quixote in disguise of a Knight, defeats him and command him not to take up arms for a year. Don Quixote Keeps up his promise and suggest that if he can not play the role of a knight, he would play the role of a Shepherd. To the surprise of all around him , Don becomes suddenly quite-san. At this time, Sancho urges him to continue their quest of Lady Ducinea. But Don Quixote was restored his normal sense. He is Alonso Quijano again. He finds himself free from all fantasies, makes his will and like a true Christian breathes his last. Thus at the time of death Don Quixote is free from all dreams like a child who puts away his toy at bedtime. He has realized that his daydreams are like toys. He does not want to keep the keep. He is completely disillusioned. The labels are now completely tuned and we do not know who is the wise man and who is fool. The readers find it very difficult to decide what is fantasy and what is reality.

         

v The tension between reason and imagination:-

          The characters of the Knight, Don Quixote and the Squire, Sancho Panza, gradually grow tighter and finally they become one man. In the beginning Sancho thinks that his master is mad and argues with him. Sometimes they quarrel also. After some months they follow the habits of each other and we find between them the relation of body and soul. Such are fellow-feeling between the two leads us to think that they represent the tension between reason and imagination. The ay type of tension exists in every one of us.

v Theme of the nature of faith.-

          Does Don Quixote believed ? Does he double? He believed and doubt at the same. In the beginning he says, “A Knight I am, and a Knight I shall dies.” After his adventure of the enchanted bark he says, “I can do no more.” Later on when he meets the images of the saints, he says, “I do not know what I am conquering by the force of man labours. The curtain falls. But life the performance, the ambiguity, does not end and everyone will go on living among truth and not-truths according to his nature.

v Universal appeal-

          Here lies the secret of Don Quixote’s popularity and immortality. The novel is not just a satire on the medieval romance on Chivalry. Its theme is permanent and universal. The knight at arms is permanent figure of the human imagination. Some he is called Hercules or Superman. Besides such heroic figures, the human imagination creates the anti-hero whose earth bound and practical personality is necessary to the other, and each is a  part of our own inner life. Here Don Quixote is the idealistic dreamer and He is the doer. While on the other hand, Sancho is the touchstone of reality. He is the taker. In this way Cervantes makes philosophical inquiry into the nature of reality and illusion through character Don Quixote and Sancho Panza.