Don Quijote: Una lectura militar y gnostica (Don Quixote: A Gnostic Interpretation as a Satire of the Military Ethos of the Spanish Empire)

Abstract

The essay is divided into two PDF documents. The first document, Cervantes I, includes the table of contents, and chapters about the history of the military strategy and aristocratic ethos of the Spanish Empire under the Habsburg dynasty (1516-1700) and its failure, as well as one chapter proposing reading Don Quixote as a gnostic satire. The second document, Cervantes II, includes three chapters and the notes and bibliography. The first two chapters in this document are historiographic analyses of Part I and Part II of Don Quixote, citing scenes from them where the failures of the military strategies and the foibles of the aristocratic ethos of Imperial Spain are illustrated. The last chapter is a brief account of Hispanic Studies in the United States since 1936, where the coming to prominence of Don Quijote and Cervantes in Hispanic literary studies is explained, and Professor Vidal's own critique is placed.