Critical images : the canonization of Don Quixote through illustrated editions of the eighteenth century / Rachel Schmidt.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Schmidt, Rachel Lynn.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Spanish literature.

Cervantes Saavedra, Miguel de, 1547-1616. Don Quixote--Illustrations.

Cervantes Saavedra, Miguel de.

Cervantes Saavedra, Miguel de, 1547-1616--Criticism and interpretation.

Physical Description:

xvii, 248 p. : ill.

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

Montreal ; Ithaca : McGill-Queen's University Press, c1999.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

How did the tall, lanky Don Quixote and the short, stout Sancho Panza become staple figures of Western iconography, so well known that their silhouettes are easily recognizable in Picasso's famous work? How did the novel Don Quixote, a parody of the romances of knight errantry, become a paean to the long-suffering, impotent nobility of its deluded protagonist? According to Rachel Schmidt, the answers to both questions are to be found in the way in which the novel's characters and episodes were depicted in early illustrated editions. In Critical Images Schmidt argues that these visual images presented critical interpretations that both formed and represented the novel's historical reception. Schmidt analyses both Spanish and English illustrations, including those by William Hogarth, John Vanderbank, Francis Hayman, José del Castillo, and Francisco de Goya y Lucientes, and explores several of the iconographic traditions present in the illustrations: the burlesque, which focuses on the work's slapstick humour; the satirical, which emphasizes Cervantes's supposed didactic, Enlightenment message; and the sentimental, which highlights Don Quixote's purity of heart and purpose. Schmidt demonstrates that the illustrations offset the neoclassical criticism contained in the same volumes and reveals an intriguing variety of historical readings, highlighting the debates, controversies, and conflicts of interests surrounding interpretations of Don Quixote. Dealing with such topical issues as canon formation, visual semiotics, and the impact of visual media on public opinion, Critical Images will be of great value not only to literary scholars and literary historians but also to art historians and those engaged in cultural and media studies.

Contents:

Front Matter

Contents

Figures

Preface

Acknowledgments

A Note on Citations

Book Illustration as Critical Interpretation of the Text

The Book Errant: Seventeenth-Century Readings and Depictions of Don Quixote

Cervantes as Hercules Musagetes: The First Neoclassical Edition

Don Quixote Every Man: Eighteenth-Century English Illustrators

“El Quixote ilustrado”: Illustration and Enlightenment in the Real Academia Edition

Conclusion: Goya and the Romantic Reading of Don Quixote

Notes

Bibliography

Index

Notes:

Bibliographic Level Mode of Issuance: Monograph

Includes bibliographical references (p. [227]-240) and index.

ISBN:

1-282-85519-0

9786612855191

0-7735-6734-8

OCLC:

929121340