Overview

Law and History in Cervantes' Don Quixote is a deep consideration of the intellectual environment that gave rise to Cervantes' seminal work. Susan Byrne demonstrates how Cervantes synthesized the debates surrounding the two most authoritative discourses of his era - those of law and history - into a new aesthetic product, the modern novel. Byrne uncovers the empirical underpinnings of Don Quixote through a close philological study of Cervantes' sly questioning of and commentary on these fields. As she skilfully demonstrates, while sixteenth-century historiographers and jurists across southern Europe sought the philosophical nexus of their fields, Cervantes created one through the adventures of a protagonist whose history is all about justice. As such, Law and History in Cervantes'Don Quixote illustrates how Cervantes' art highlighted the inconsistencies of juridical-historical texts and practice, as well as anticipated the ultimate resolution of their paradoxes.

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9781442626409

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Reviews

'This is a substantive work of investigation, analysis, and metacriticism. Highly recommended.' -- E.H. Friedman Choice Magazine, vol 50:08:2013 'Learned and insightful, Susan Byrne's book provides a new look at Cervantes's masterpiece through the lenses of law and history in order to highlight and clarify how the novel engages in specific arguments that foreground these topics. Her book is one more testimony of Cervantes's wide learning and willingness to engage in the most important issues of his day as he composed what came to be considered as the first modern novel.' -- Frederick A. de Armas Revista de Estudios Hispanicos

Author Information

Susan Byrne is an associate professor in the Department of Spanish and Portuguese at Yale University.

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