If life be a quest in which a grail be
sought, with knights sitting around a round table going on separate journeys,
what happens when the quest is quixotic with no reward in sight, interminably
beyond the horizon, obscured by the curvature of the earth, where no laurels,
no medals or medallions, or any purpose under heaven can be found? What then?
Are we to determine that the quest has been a failure or do we make a great
legend of our exploits, our quixotic battle against windmills, the taverns that
we convert into castles a testament to our gift for embellishment, our wooing
of Dulcinea, a figment of our imagination, a glorious dream?
A Mystical Altar For Dulcinea -- Jorge Ramlo
"El Ingenioso Hidalgo Don Quijote de la Mancha" (The Ingenious Nobleman Sir Quixote of La Mancha) was published in 2 parts (1605 and 1615) by Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra. In the novel
ReplyDeleteAldonza Lorenzo was a peasant girl from La Mancha, an arid elevated plateau (610 m or 2000 ft.) in central Spain, one of the country's most sparsely populated areas. The name is probably derived from the Arab "al-mansha" ("the dry land" or "wilderness"), and the word "mancha" means "spot," "stain," or "patch." Although the woman never actually appeared in the novel,in his imagination Don Quixote elevated her into a "lady" for whom he would perform chivalric feats. To him, "her name is Dulcinea, her country El Toboso, a village of La Mancha, her rank must be at least that of a princess, since she is my queen and lady, and her beauty superhuman, since all the impossible and fanciful attributes of beauty which the poets apply to their ladies are verified in her; for her hairs are gold, her forehead Elysian fields, her eyebrows rainbows, her eyes suns, her cheeks roses, her lips coral, her teeth pearls, her neck alabaster, her bosom marble, her hands ivory, her fairness snow, and what modesty conceals from sight such, I think and imagine, as rational reflection can only extol, not compare." In the Spanish of the time, "dulcinea" meant an overly elegant "sweetness." but now, due to the novel's influence, a reference to someone as one's "Dulcinea" implies hopeless devotion and love for her, and particularly unrequited love.However, it has also been used generically to mean mistress or sweetheart.