From: Cervantes: Bulletin of the Cervantes Society of America
10.2 (1990): 37-53.
Copyright © 1990, The Cervantes Society of America
The ‘Knight of the Broken Lance’ and his ‘Trusty
Steed’: On Don Quixote and Rocinante
s part of the elaborate
parody of the romances of chivalry in Don Quixote, Cervantes teasingly
calls into question his knight's potency in a systematic fashion. The
knights-errant that populate the libros de caballerías test
their prowess in every arena, often including the erotic, as both Arthur
Efron (41) and Daniel Eisenberg (Romances of Chivalry 82-83) have
argued. One of the many failings of Don Quixote in his imitation of the knights
of old is his inability to liberate himself from the moral restrictions that
bridle “estos nuestros detestables siglos” (I.11, 157). In Don
Quixote, Cervantes employs numerous strategies to hint humoristically
that his protagonist's moral continence may be accompanied by a psychological
or even physical impotence.1 Even if we
1 The
issue of Don Quixote's sexuality has received substantial critical attention,
and from a wide variety of perspectives. In general, these treatments tend
to regard our hero's comic asexuality with far more seriousness than Cervantes
must have intended. Cesáreo Bandera, for example, sees Don Quixote
as a victim of what he terms “metaphysical desire” (Mimesis
conflictiva 72); Ruth El Saffar posits that Don Quixote's preoccupation
with books is a symptom of his fear of the body (Beyond Fiction 54);
Félix [p. 38] Martínez-Bonati argues
that the knight's impotence and fear of sex lead him to create the defense
mechanism of Dulcinea, the unattainable ideal that gives him an excuse to
remain virginal (“El Quijote: juego y significación”
330); Daniel Eisenberg extrapolates from the novel a rejection of sexuality
on the part of Cervantes (A Study of Don Quixote 125, in note);
Carroll B. Johnson offers some compelling arguments for Don Quixote's impotence
and fear of castration (Madness and Lust 158 & 167) and John G.
Weiger, in an essay on “Sexual Sublimation” in Don Quixote,
concludes that the knight's sexual timidity and general lack of interest
in the topic are due to his impotence. This chapter of The Individuated
Self (31-63) is perhaps the most insightful study to date on Don Quixote's
sexuality, especially in its fine analysis of the sexual implications of
the Cueva de Montesinos episode (49-63). Arthur Efron, in his chapter
“The Benumbed Knight”, studies the protagonist's denial of the
body as a function of his masochism (Don Quixote and the Dulcineated
World 22-64). Finally, Benito Brancaforte uses a psychoanalytical approach
that yields many incisive observations on Don Quixote's impotence in “El
diálogo de Cervantes con la locura “ (See especially 336-39).
37
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give our hero the benefit of the doubt and allow that he is able to govern
his baser impulses to mimic the virtue of chaste Amadís de Gaula,
it is no little disappointment that he cannot hold the passionate reins of
his frisky mount Rocinante, “la mejor pieza que comía pan en
el mundo” (I.2, 85). This study will consider some of the apparent symbols
of Don Quixote's impotence that he cloaks with vows of chastity. It will
also examine the juxtaposition of a master who ineptly struggles to follow
the path of virtue with a very carnal and worldly nag, an endless source
of humor in the novel, and a constant suggestion of the knight's symbolic,
and perhaps literal impotence.
One of the most obvious phallic symbols that
the reader associates with Don Quixote is the brazo fuerte that he
brandishes with pride on numerous occasions throughout the novel. Nevertheless,
when put to the test, it is an arm that wilts at every encounter. Don Quixote
himself inadvertently seems to associate his arm with his sexuality early
in the novel, when he addresses the girls at the inn: “y el valor de
mi brazo descubra el deseo que tengo de serviros” (I.2, 86). The arm,
which metonymically comes to represent the knight, is boastfully termed
fuerte, invencible, invicto, valeroso e
invenerable, incansable and
poderoso.2 It
2
“vuestro fuerte brazo” (I.29, 364); “del valor de su invencible
brazo” (I.29, 370); “ese invicto brazo” (I.30, 372); “del
valor de vuestro valeroso e invenerable brazo” (I.37, 459-60); “mi
incansable brazo” (I.46, 550); “la fuerza invencible dese poderoso
brazo” (II.26, 246) and “el valor de su poderoso brazo” (II.54,
446).
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seems, however, that the only success his arm can muster is a figurative
destruction of sexuality. In “The Beheading of the Giant: An Obscene
Metaphor in Don Quixote,” Revista Hispánica Moderna
39.4 (1976-77): 141-49, Javier Herrero argues that Don Quixote's beheading
of the giant Pandafilando is an obscene metaphor of castration. Frightened
or jealous of this symbol of potency, Don Quixote is determined to deflate
what Herrero sees as a huge, erect phallus: “pienso, con la ayuda de
Dios y de mi brazo, tajar la cabeza soberbia con los filos desta
. . . no quiero decir buena espada” (I.30, 377). After a fashion,
Don Quixote's attempt to quash sexuality is successful. In most other instances,
Cervantes manages a humorous effect whenever Don Quixote proudly displays
his valorous arm by making him unable to accomplish his boasts. The arm is
literally and figuratively impotent.
There is one episode in the novel where Don
Quixote's arm as phallic symbol is incontrovertible and unspeakably obscene.
It is, of course, the scene at the inn where Maritornes and the innkeeper's
daughter play their famous trick on the knight. Don Quixote fears what he
imagines to be the sexual advances of the lady who, “vencida de su amor,
tornaba a solicitarle” (I.43, 527). The novel's notorious ambiguity
allows us to read an overtly hilarious admission of impotence into Don Quixote's
words to his would-be admirer: “lástima os tengo, fermosa
señora, de que hayades puesto vuestras amorosas mientes en parte
donde no es posible corresponderos conforme merece vuestro gran valor
y gentileza” (I.43, 527, emphasis added). Always the gentleman, Don
Quixote nevertheless accedes to the request to allow his hand to be introduced
through the hole of the hayloft to the lady, “por poder deshogar con
ella el gran deseo que a este agujero la ha traído, tan a peligro
de su honor” (I.43, 527). The parody of sexual penetration is obvious
to any reader. The image really becomes obscene when Don Quixote proudly
describes his virginal appendage:
—Tomad, señora, esa mano, o, por mejor decir, ese verdugo de
los malhechores del mundo; tomad esa mano, digo, a quien no ha tocado otra
de mujer alguna, ni aun la de aquella que tiene entera posesión de
todo mi cuerpo. No os la doy para que la beséis, sino para que
miréis la contextura de sus nervios, la trabazón de sus
músculos, la anchura y espaciosidad de sus venas; de donde sacaréis
qué tal debe de ser la fuerza del brazo que tal mano tiene (I.43,
528).
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The ladies, of course, slip a loop around Don Quixote's wrist and leave him
dangling precariously. If we accept the imagery I ascribe to this episode,
then our hero's lament is hilarious: “ni es bien que en tan poca
parte venguéis el todo de vuestro enojo” (I.43, 528).
Figuratively, Don Quixote is forced into sex against his will. He tries to
extricate himself, but in vain: “tiraba de su brazo, por ver si podía
soltarse; mas él estaba tan bien asido, que todas sus pruebas fueron
en vano” (I.43, 529). That is to say, he is unable to complete the sex
act. The knight “bramaba como un toro” (I.43, 529), but the
“estirado señor” (I.43, 531) is unable to remove his arm.
The episode culminates in a suggestion of castration, as Rocinante moves
away and leaves his master suspended in the air: “cosa que le causó
tanto dolor, que creyó, o que la muñeca le cortaban, o que
el brazo se le arrancaba” (I.43, 531).
The lance is a second phallic symbol that merits
further analysis. Helena Percas de Ponseti, in her discussion of Don Quixote's
encounter with the lions, terms the lance “a phallic symbol” and
“a weapon of earthly character” (Cervantes the Writer 47).
Originally considered a noble weapon (Vale 114), the size of the lance as
well as its shape obviously facilitated its association with the phallus.
The lance was generally some twelve feet long, but other types of lances
reached almost hyperbolic dimensions. The Spanish pike, a lance made of ash
with a steel tip, was eighteen feet long and weighed more than ten pounds
(Martin & Parker 36). Certain lances used by a band of mercenaries known
as lansquenets reached lengths of twenty-four to twenty-seven feet
(Demmin 414). The lance as an exaggerated phallic symbol, then, would seem
an obvious association, and one which had at least one precedent in Spanish
literature that Cervantes may have been aware
of.3
3 Brian
Dutton's Cancionero project has turned up an interesting poem in the
Cancionero de San Román (ca. 1454, Real Academia de la Historia).
Catalogued as [ID0328] MH1-65, the original title is missing. Professor Dutton
offers the title “Lanzas”, and believes it is the work of Juan
de Mena. In the poem, certain married ladies of the court complain to the
king: “mas el bien de nuestro lecho / es vn canpo contrafecho / de tan
flacos estandartes / que ninguna de las partes / nunca lieua su derecho.”
The ladies would have their husbands better armed: “datnos gente bien
armada / para dar este conbate / ca la gente que tenemos / por fallarla cada
dia / desarenada quando çia / floxamente con los Remos.” The
key stanza, and the one which explicitly refers to the phallus as a lance,
is perhaps the [p. 41] most humorous of the poem:
“Mas quien desto se reçela / deue dar esta cabtela / ensayarse
sienpre dantes / ca non es abto de galanes / non yr diestro por la tela /
& quien rige gruesa lança / o quien tal poder alcança /
venga firme como deue / el que desto non se atreue /pierda luego el
esperança.” I am grateful to Professor Dutton for sharing this
poem with me.
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Don Quixote is unable to effect his burning
desire for conquests, and this failing is depicted visually in the form of
broken and “dulled” lances in the novel. If the Knight of the Woeful
Countenance brags often of the strength of his arm, the references to his
lance are even more frequent. This primary weapon of the knights-errant was
imbued with a deep symbolism:
—Se da al caballero una lanza, para significar verdad. Porque
la verdad es cosa recta, que no se tuerce, y la verdad se adelanta a la falsedad.
El hierro de la lanza significa la fuerza que la verdad tiene sobre la falsedad;
y el pendón significa que la verdad se demuestra a todos, y no tiene
pavor ni de la falsedad ni del engaño. También la verdad es
apoyo de la esperanza; y esto, como otras cosas, vienen significadas en la
lanza que recibe el caballero (Lulio 66).
If the lance represents truth, it is significant that Don Quixote constantly
shatters or dulls his lances. His lances also seem to lack pendones, or banners,
a shortcoming that could be interpreted as a castration image. The importance
of the lance for chivalry is evident in the well-known name of a knight of
the Arthurian tradition, derived from the weapon: Sir Lancelot. The name
is tellingly rendered in Spanish as Lanzarote. Don Quixote wields his lance
with the same pride in which he holds his “powerful” arm, with
the same predictably funny results. His instrument, generally a phallic symbol,
is rarely equal to the task, and therefore winds up broken or blunted.
Don Quixote's lance is first destroyed in the
episode of the Toledo traders (I.4, 101), where a muleteer not only shatters
it, but to add insult to injury, he beats the knight severely with one of
its pieces. After recuperating at home, Don Quixote takes leave for the second
time with Sancho Panza and a new lance in tow. It is not long, however, before
this lance suffers the same fate as the first. In his joust with the windmills,
Don Quixote's lance is again splintered (I.8, 130). To make up for this grave
shortcoming in his arms, Don Quixote steals from the inn a
lanzón, perhaps a more fitting symbol of his masculinity, since
it is
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substantially shorter than the normal lance. Not surprisingly, the
lanzón also perishes at the inn (I.45, 543) in mock battle
with the barber, an ironic and apt foe for Don Quixote, since our hero had
symbolically castrated his adversary in the acquisition of Mambrino' s
helmet.4
Cervantes exploits the relationship between
Don Quixote and his lance for comic undermining of his protagonist in several
different ways in the course of the novel. Our hero literally depends on
his lance, for example, by leaning on it for support (recostarse and
arrimarse are the verbs employed) on at least two occasions (I.43,
526 & II.10, 105). This literal and figurative dependence on his lance
suggests that Don Quixote feels powerless and emasculated when he does not
have his lance at hand. Consider, for example, his reaction when surprised
by Roque Guinart's bandits: “que si me hallaran sobre mi caballo, con
mi lanza y con mi escudo, no les fuera muy fácil rendirme” (II.60,
495). Another strategy to use the lance as a symbol of Don Quixote's potency
involves the size of the lance. We have already mentioned our hero's use
of the shorter lanzón after breaking his first two lances.
By contrast, consider the description of the size of Sansón Carrasco's
lance while disguised as the Caballero de los Espejos: “la lanza, que
tenía arrimada a un árbol, era grandísima y gruesa,
y de un hierro acerado de más de un palmo” (II.14, 140). The
simplest technique that Cervantes employs to figuratively pull the rug out
from beneath Don Quixote and his lance is to make him brandish it ineffectively.
We see this in the episode of the herd of the bulls (another symbolic adversary
in their legendary sexual potency), when Don Quixote, “embrazando su
escudo y tomando su lanza “ (II.58, 480), is unceremoniously stampeded,
his lance once again useless. Finally, there is a suggestion of impotence,
or “blunted” lances, in something that Don Quixote says on arms
and letters: “que nunca la lanza embotó la pluma, ni la pluma
la lanza” (I.18, 226). A similar image is found in an ironic comment
that Sancho makes on the “virtue” of Altisidora, though here arrow
tips, and not
4 In
“Heroic Striving and Don Quixote's Emblematic Prudence,” a forthcoming
article in Bulletin of Hispanic Studies, I argue that the barber's
surrendering of the basin that will become the yelmo de Mambrino is
an emblematic act of symbolic castration. By donning the helmet as a spoil
of war, epic tradition dictates that Don Quixote will assume its unique
properties: impotence and emasculation.
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lances, are dulled: “la vergüenza y recato de las doncellas se
despuntan y embotan las amorosas saetas; pero en esta Altisidora más
parece que se aguzan que despuntan” (II.58, 475). Indeed, Altisidora
strives to excite Don Quixote sexually. In short, Cervantes uses the arm
and the lance, and of course the sword, throughout the novel to intimate
that his protagonist is not nearly as potent as the knights-errant he attempts
to imitate.
As another aspect of the parody of the romances
of chivalry in Don Quixote, the hapless knight lives in mortal fear
of sex and sexuality, as we have seen in the adventure of Pandafilando. Unlike
certain lusty lancemen that grace the pages of the romances, Don Quixote
finds all things carnal distasteful and even repugnant. The comic irony is
evident: by rejecting sexuality so vehemently, our protagonist comes to imitate
not the knights-errant that fill his fantasy, but rather the damsels in distress
who chastely struggle to protect their virtue. Examples abound in the novel.
The disaster at the inn during the nocturnal visit of Maritornes (I.16, 202)
is directly attributable to Don Quixote's exaggerated concern for his
honestidad. Again, the novel's ambiguity allows the reader to interpret
our hero's explanation as an admission of impotence: “que, aunque de
mi voluntad quisiera satisfacer a la vuestra, fuera imposible” (I.16,
204). Nevertheless, Don Quixote does experience temptations of the flesh
in the novel, at times real and at times staged. On at least one occasion,
the protagonist himself lets slip a desire for women which he usually manages
to sublimate. Don Quixote is profoundly disturbed, perhaps in his role as
“damsel in distress”, when the duchess offers four doncellas
to tend to his private needs: “así entrarán ellas en mi
aposento, ni cosa que lo parezca, como volar . . . Déjeme
. . . que yo ponga una muralla en medio de mis deseos y de mi
honestidad” (II.44, 369).
The main function of Altisidora in the novel
is precisely to test the limits of Don Quixote's personal decorum and to
bait his masculinity. From II.44 to the end of the novel, the bumbling knight
perceives her as a threat to his purity, and flees all contact with Altisidora.
The nocturnal visit in which Don Quixote supposes Doña Rodríguez
to be Altisidora intent on despoiling his innocence is important in that
it constitutes an unambiguous declaration of what the reader has probably
already concluded: the knight's virginity. Cervantes seems intent on turning
the world topsy-turvy and poking fun at his protagonist by means of sexual
inversion. His concern for his chastity is behavior more appropriate to the
maiden than to the knight:
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—¿Quién sabe si el diablo, que es sutil y mañoso,
querrá engañarme agora con una dueña, lo que no ha podido
con emperatrices, reinas, duquesas, marquesas ni condesas? . . .
Y ¿quién sabe si esta soledad, esta ocasión y este silencio
despertará mis deseos que duermen, y harán que al cabo de mis
años venga a caer donde nunca he tropezado? (II.48, 398)
Though Don Quixote never actually capitulates to carnal desire in the novel,
his integrity inviolate, there seem to be moments propitious for a fall from
virtue. Thus, in spite of his better judgement and his wounds, Don Quixote
is prepared to receive into his arms Maritornes, the imagined princess of
the castle: “sentándose en la cama, a pesar de sus bizmas y con
dolor de sus costillas, tendió los brazos para recibir a su fermosa
doncella” (I.16, 203).
Cervantes provides Don Quixote with an iron-clad
chivalric excuse for his aversion to sex in the novel. After the battle with
the Biscayan, the sight of his damaged helmet so infuriates our knight that
he takes a solemn vow “de hacer la vida que hizo el grande marqués
de Mantua cuando juró de vengar la muerte de su sobrino Valdovinos,
que fue de no comer pan a manteles, ni con su mujer folgar
. . . hasta tomar entera venganza del que tal desaguisado me
fizo” (I.10, 150, emphasis added). Although he renounces the part on
seeking vengeance, Don Quixote swears to uphold the rest. In point of fact,
he manages only to avoid sex, for later Sancho takes him to task for eating
“pan a manteles” (I.19, 228). Whether Don Quixote refrains from
intimate relationships out of fear or out of an exaggerated sense of chivalric
honor, he would have Sancho believe that the disenchantment of Dulcinea is
an urgent matter that prevents him from expressing his sexuality: “tú
vives en descuido; yo muero deseando” (II.60, 492).
If we grant that Don Quixote is endowed with
normal human desires, the novel is somewhat vague with respect to his ability
to moderate his animal passion. One of the many manifestations of the theme
of art vs. nature in Don Quixote is the role of reason and morality
vs. passion and natural human instinct. Don Quixote is never decisive on
the relative merits of the two contrasting (though occasionally harmonious)
concepts. He justifies his own outbursts of rage by telling Sancho that
“los primeros movimientos no son en mano del hombre” (I.20, 250;
repeated, with a slight variation, in I.30, 379). However, when the knight
discovers that his chronicler is Cide Hamete, he fears
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that his passion for Dulcinea will have been treated indecently. It is indeed
ironic that in amorous matters, Don Quixote contradicts himself by avowing
that he has managed to moderate erotic “first movements”:
“menospreciando reinas, emperatrices y doncellas de todas calidades,
teniendo a raya los ímpetus de los naturales movimientos” (II.3,
59). By means of his contradictory discourse, Don Quixote undermines his
lofty morals at every turn. This is another use of humor in the novel to
contrast the protagonist with the knights he fails to imitate.
In addition to castration images implicit in
the beheading of the giant Pandafilando, in the trick played on him at the
inn by Maritornes and the innkeeper's daughter and in the surrendering of
the yelmo de Mambrino, several others appear in the course of the
novel. Their function is to cast comic aspersions on Don Quixote's imaginary
sexual prowess. For example, in the battle with the Biscayan, as Sancho is
quick to point out, Don Quixote emerged “con media oreja y media celada
menos” (I.18, 217), a significant loss of person and armor.
Uncharacteristically, Don Quixote laments the pain of this loss on three
occasions (I.10, 150; I.10, 152 & I.12, 161). The most interesting allusion
to castration does not directly concern Don Quixote, except in the contrast
it creates with his own situation. Sancho and Doña Rodríguez,
in front of the duke and duchess, discuss the verisimilitude of the historical
ballad on the penitence of king Rodrigo. Lascivious Rodrigo was condemned
to be buried alive with toads and vipers to atone for his carnal sins. After
two days in the tomb, he was heard to lament: “Ya me comen, ya me comen
/ por do más pecado había” (II.33,
299).5 This rather shocking image of the mighty
fallen because of succumbing to temptations of the flesh is perhaps an ironic
commentary on Don Quixote's situation. The knight's figurative emasculation
is a consequence of his fear of sex, while the monarch's literal castration
results from indulging his desires. Both extremes lead to the same end.
At no point does our hero perceive this irony.
Rather, he is doomed to wrestle futilely with the paradox of desire and moral
restraint. By embracing the extreme of effeminate chastity in the
5 For
versions of the “Penitencia del rey don Rodrigo,” see: Diego
Catalán et al., El romancero pan-hispánico: Catálogo
general descriptivo (Madrid: Seminario Menéndez-Pidal, 1982) 7-19
and María Goyri & Ramón Menéndez Pidal, eds.,
Romancero tradicional de las lenguas hispánicas
(español-portugués-catalán-Sefardí) [Madrid:
Gredos, 1957] 58-95.
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mistaken belief that it would make him more knightly, Don Quixote instead
becomes an object of ridicule. The parodic intent of Cervantes is further
enhanced by the depiction of Don Quixote's horse,
Rocinante.6 In physique, in temperament, and
perhaps in spirit, Rocinante parallels his ridiculous master in most respects.
As evidenced by his many literal and symbolic falls, Rocinante is a horse
unequal to the chivalric task undertaken by Don Quixote. Nevertheless, if
Rocinante's stumbles in battle are pardonable, his unabashed carnal excesses
are a source of embarrassment and aggravation to a master who strives endlessly
to hold the reins on his own animal passion.
Cervantes explores the tension between art
and nature in a number of arenas in Don Quixote. We see this problematic
antithesis embodied, for example, in the conflict between society and the
limitations it imposes (art), and the theme of freedom (nature). As is his
custom, Cervantes finds problems with both polarities. Freedom leads to abuse,
as in the episode of the galley slaves, and society tends to be too restrictive
of the individual's innate tendency towards creative expression. Freedom
vs. society therefore comes to constitute another example of problematic
reality in the novel, fraught with irony and ambiguity. Cervantes uses Rocinante
to explore this problem in the form of the demystification of the pastoral
ideal.
Freedom is absolute in the pastoral bower,
according to the eclogues and idylls of Theocritus and Virgil, and this liberty
extends to the realm of the erotic. Renaissance pastoral attempts to purge
overt sexuality from the human love ideal, although reminders of the sexual
anarchy of classical pastoral abound. The episode of the
yangüeses evokes the entirety of the pastoral tradition. It begins
with a typical description of a pastoral locus amoenus: “vinieron
a parar a un prado lleno de fresca yerba, junto del cual corría un
arroyo apacible y fresco; tanto, que convidó y forzó a pasar
allí las horas de la siesta” (I.15, 190). Captured by the enchantment
of the pastoral ideal, Don Quixote and Sancho allow their beasts the freedom
to graze at will, “a su albedrío y sin orden alguna” (II.59,
483), perhaps an evocation of some anonymous octavas in vogue (Blecua
515). The lifting of the bridle
6 Most
early studies on Rocinante blindly adhered to an idealized vision of his
role in the novel. See, for example: Ramón González-Alegre,
“Meditación sobre Rocinante,” Nuestro Tiempo 55 (1959):
23-43 and Marcial José Bayo, “Rocinante y Clavileño, caballos
de don Quijote,” Miscelânea de Estudos a Joaquim de Carvalho
4 (1960): 414-24.
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leads to predictable consequences: a beast (and presumably a man in similar
circumstances), will follow his natural instincts when left unfettered: “No
se había curado Sancho de echar sueltas a Rocinante, seguro de que
le conocía por tan manso y tan poco rijoso, que todas las yeguas de
la dehesa de Córdoba no le hicieran tomar mal siniestro” (I.15,
190-91). But unlike the humorous restraint shown by Don Quixote, Rocinante
indeed becomes “restless at the sight of females”
(rijoso7). His attempt to indulge in
the erotic anarchy promised by the classical pastoral ideal leads to disaster,
both for himself and the granters of freedom, Don Quixote and Sancho:
Sucedió, pues, que a Rocinante le vino en deseo de refocilarse con
las señoras facas, y saliendo, así como las olió, de
su natural paso y costumbre, sin pedir licencia a su dueño, tomó
un trotico algo picadillo y se fue a comunicar su necesidad con ellas. Mas
ellas, que, a lo que pareció, debían de tener más gana
de pacer que de ál, recibiéronle con las herraduras y con los
dientes (I.15, 191).8
The arrieros beat Rocinante to the ground with their stakes to punish
his boldness, then turn their wrath on Don Quixote and Sancho. The latter's
lament entails, perhaps, the moral of the story: “jamás tal
creí de Rocinante; que te tenía por persona casta y tan
pacífica como yo. En fin, bien dicen que es menester mucho tiempo
para venir a conocer a las personas, y que no hay cosa segura en esta vida”
(I.15, 194). It is, of course, ridiculous to hold Rocinante to human standards
of conduct, as Fernández Suárez has pointed out (170). Cervantes
reiterates at chapter's end that the drubbings are due to “la demasiada
libertad de aquel día” (I.15, 197).
Indeed, Rocinante always follows his instincts,
much to the chagrin of his master, who would have his horse be superhuman,
or “unnatural”, like himself. The ensuing chapter may be interpreted
as an indication that men too must pay the consequences of indulging their
animal passions. The muleteer
7 The
Tesoro de la lengua gives the following definition: “Rixoso,
el que siempre está aparejado para reñir. Cavallo rixoso, el
inquieto, particularmente quando veen las yeguas, y siempre se lleva mal
con los otros cavallos” (910).
8 Olga Prjevalinsky
Ferrer establishes in “Del Asno de Oro a Rocinante:
Contribución al estudio del Quijote,” Cuadernos de
Literatura 3 (1948): 247-57, that Rocinante's desire to “refocilarse
con las señoras facas” may be based on a similar passage from
the Asno de Oro (255).
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had arranged to “communicate his needs” with Maritornes at night.
The verb that Cervantes chooses to express the dallying,
refocilarse,9 is the same he used for
Rocinante: “había el arriero concertado con ella que aquella
noche se refocilarían juntos” (I.16, 201). As we have already
seen, Don Quixote inexplicably opens his arms to receive his “fermosa
doncella” (I.16, 203), and therefore he is made to pay the consequences
of surrendering to his misplaced desires. On some level, Don Quixote seems
to make a connection between his pecadillo and that of his nag: “y
después me molió de tal suerte que estoy peor que ayer cuando
los gallegos, que, por demasías de Rocinante, nos hicieron el agravio
que sabes” (I.17, 207-08).
Don Quixote's faith in unreliable Rocinante,
“flor y espejo de los caballos” (I.49, 577), is a great source
of humor in the novel. In the trick played by Maritornes and the innkeeper's
daughter, to which we alluded previously, Don Quixote manages to relieve
the pressure on his arm by balancing on Rocinante: “no osaba hacer
movimiento alguno, puesto que de la paciencia y quietud de Rocinante bien
se podía esperar que estaría sin moverse un siglo entero”
(I.43, 528-29). Again however, the natural instinct of sexual arousal causes
Rocinante to betray his master's ill-placed trust:
una de las cabalgaduras en que venían los cuatro que llamaban se
llegó a oler a Rocinante, que, melancólico y triste, con las
orejas caídas, sostenía sin moverse a su estirado señor;
y como, en fin, era de carne, aunque parecía de leño, no pudo
dejar de resentirse y tornar a oler a quien le llegaba a hacer caricias;
y así, no se hubo movido tanto cuanto, cuando se desviaron los juntos
pies de don Quijote, y resbalando de la silla, dieran con él en el
suelo, a no quedar colgado del brazo (I.43, 531).
In this instance, Don Quixote suffers the consequences, possibly because
of his concupiscence in this adventure (“Authorial
9 Howard
Mancing takes note of the peculiar use of the verb refocilarse in
the novel (The Chivalric World 59). Martín Alonso provides
the following significant definition in his Enciclopedia del idioma:
“Recrear, alegrar. Dic. particularmente de las cosas que calientan y
dan vigor” (vol. III: 3552). Carlos Fernández Gómez provides
another instance where Cervantes uses the term to mean sexual dalliance in
his Vocabulario de Cervantes. The text in question is from the
Coloquio de los perros: “Baxaua la negra, como has oydo, a
refocilarse cõ el negro” (879).
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The ‘Knight of the Broken Lance’ |
49 |
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Strings” 54), but more likely because he has foolishly expected Rocinante
to conform to human standards of behavior.
Time and again, Don Quixote and/or Rocinante
bite off more than they can chew, and the result is usually a beating, complete
with a literal and symbolic fall of one or both. This is the case, for example,
when Rocinante, frightened by the bogiganga, streaks away “con
más ligereza, que jamás prometieron los huesos de su notomía
“ (II.11, 117). Don Quixote has lost figurative and literal control
of the reins of Rocinante, especially as concerns sexual matters. As a result
of this and other moments of “freedom”, both take a tumble,
“ordinario fin y paradero de las lozanías de Rocinante y de sus
atrevimientos” (II.11, 117).
Rocinante, “leal y bien acondicionado”
(I.18, 225), just one of the many ironic epithets ascribed to him, apparently
does not escape chastisement for his frisky indiscretions. When Don Diego
de Miranda tries to hurry his mare past Rocinante, to avoid any indecorous
behavior on the part of the nag, Sancho tries to allay his fear: “nuestro
caballo es el más honesto y bien mirado del mundo; jamás en
semejantes ocasiones ha hecho vileza alguna, y una vez que se desmandó
a hacerla la lastamos mi señor y yo con las setenas” (II.16,
150). Sancho's hyperbolic understatement aside, the humor again depends on
master and squire trying to force their beast to conform to human standards
of behavior and morality. The use of the verb desmandarse to describe
Rocinante's passionate nature is symptomatic of this absurd effort, for
“going astray” has strong moral connotations. Man and beast are
equally susceptible to the call of nature, notwithstanding Don Quixote's
ridiculous protestations to the contrary. Consequently, the novel's events
tend to punish Don Quixote for his outrageous efforts to reject his human
nature. Poor Rocinante, in turn, suffers whenever he capitulates to his natural
instincts. The former pays for rejecting the liberty that life offers him;
the latter for taking liberties.
There is at least one subtle suggestion that
frisky Rocinante's desire to disport is, like Don Quixote's, impossible to
effect. Sancho, in asking Sansón Carrasco about the contents of the
first part of the novel already in print, inquires about the episode of the
yangüeses: “dígame, señor bachiller —dijo
a esta sazón Sancho—: ¿entra ahí la aventura de los
yangüeses, cuando a nuestro buen Rocinante se le antojó pedir
cotufas en el golfo?” (II.3, 61). As Ordoñez Vila has indicated
with reference to the “incapacidad física” of Rocinante,
the expression “pedir cotufas en el
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golfo” means “to ask for the impossible” (60). Ambiguity allows
us to interpret this as an ironic comment on Rocinante's potency, although
the more likely meaning refers to the moral restriction imposed on him by
his master. Rocinante's sexuality also seems to be jokingly questioned in
the account given of his friendship with Sancho's rucio. Once again,
it is the novel's intentional ambiguity that leads the reader to explore
beyond the literal meaning and question the authorial intention: “hay
fama, por tradición de padres a hijos, que el autor desta verdadera
historia hizo particulares capítulos della [la amistad entre los
animales]; mas que, por guardar la decencia y decoro que a tan heroica historia
se debe, no los puso en ella” (II.12, 122). The passage cited continues
to arouse suspicions as it relates the occasions in which nag and ass came
together to “scratch” each other until they were both tired and
“satisfied” (II.12, 122). An ironic reading is certainly
feasible.
P. E. Russell, in his attempt to recuperate
the pre-romantic view of Don Quixote, suggests that “Cervantes
simply wanted to give his readers something to laugh at” (313). Any
suggestion of Don Quixote's impotence is not to be taken too seriously nor
used as ammunition to mount an argument on his creator's sexuality. It is
all part of the elaborate trick that Cervantes plays on his protagonist by
making him a hilarious parody of the knights of chivalry. Don Quixote fails
miserably in his imitation of the knights-errant. The would-be knight is
fully aware of the lascivious pursuits of some chivalric heroes. He notes,
for example, using the same word rijoso that is usually reserved for
beasts, that: “de don Galaor, hermano de Amadís de Gaula, se
murmura que fue más que demasiadamente rijoso” (II.2, 57). Don
Galaor is nevertheless included in the list of the persecuted virtuous. One
of the primary reasons for Don Quixote's failed imitation of the knights
of chivalry is that he is a product of his times, unable to accept the moral
laxity that underlies the actions of many of his fictional heroes. The paradox
of virtuous deeds for the common good and libertine indulgences to satisfy
the individual is one that the “knight of the broken lance” is
never able to resolve.
Regardless of the reasons underlying Don Quixote's
rejection of sexuality, it is clear that Cervantes systematically undermined
his protagonist's chivalric aspirations by means of a figurative, if not
literal, impotence. Modern criticism of the novel posits that Cervantes
successfully intuited contemporary psychological theories
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of sexual dysfunction. While I admit the validity of these interpretations,
I believe that the symbols of Don Quixote's impotence that I have elaborated
in this study, namely the limp arm and the broken lance, can contribute to
the reader's impression of Don Quixote as a funny parody of the romances
of chivalry. And with P. E. Russell, I would hasten to add that this rich
vein of humor in the novel in no way negates its “profundity as a work
of art, or its own kind of seriousness” (313).
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HOLY CROSS |
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Digitized with
the help of Contessa Marion |
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