Date: Fri, 29 Apr 2005 00:54:10
-0400 (EDT)
From: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Molinos quijotescos
To: [log in to unmask]
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Original-recipient: rfc822;[log in to unmask]
Well, a good writer can be good at using
imagery, sounds (rhythm, consonant and vowel combinations, etc.), ideas,
psychology, symbolism, etc. Cervantes was good at all of these
things, and he was indeed very good at using imagery, that is, at
presenting striking visual situations. This is fundamental to the
narrative art, and a great many writers who are considered very good
novelists are nowhere near as good as Cervantes was in this regard.
His situations are visually memorable. So the selection of the
windmills makes great sense. Even today one is enchanted by the
view of windmills on a field. Finally, the verticality and size of
the windmills, with their moving arms, can imaginatively correspond to
giants indeed on the Manchegan horizon. One could add the symbolism
of wind in the head associated with madness and so forth as I believe one
colleague has already done. Or one could add that a force of
nature,, wind, animates the windmills, in a display of irresistible force
that anyone who has encountered a force of nature, from wind to waters to
fire can appreciate. Nature is under certain circumstances
irresistible. So battling these machines that are as close to
nature as a machine can be makes DQ's attempt even more foolhardy,
more....Quixotic. But this would only be the icing on the
cake. The windmills episode is basically memorable because it is
visually memorable. As a painter I am sure Theo will agree with
this. Dario Fernandez-Morera, Northwestern University.