For Aristotle, a tragic story portrays «a man not pre-eminently virtuous or just, whose misfortune however is brought upon him, not by vice or depravity, but by some error of judgment», Ibid., p. 50. Alonso Quijano does not exactly fit Aristotle's definition of either a tragic or a comic character. His madness, however, can be regarded as an involuntary «error» which makes him pass «from happiness to misery» (p. 50). Thus the unfolding of his chivalric career is strikingly similar to a tragic reversal of fortunes. (N. from the A.)

Ibid., p. 50. (N. from the A.)

I have attempted a study of these combinations of parody and pathos in The Half-way House of Fiction, pp. 170-202. (N. from the A.)

For more detailed commentary, see The Half-way House of Fiction, pp. 170-200. (N. from the A.)

Aristotle says of the action of an epic that it should be «a complete whole in itself, with a beginning, middle and end so as to enable the work to produce its own proper pleasure with all the organic unity of a living creature» (Aristotle on the Art of Poetry, p. 79). However, this organic unity applies only to those elements that are essential to the plot, and not to every single episode in the story. At one point Aristotle remarks that «the argument of the Odyssey is not a long one» and after summarizing its four or five basic elements, concludes: «This being all that is proper to the Odyssey, everything else in it is episode» (p. 63). By analogy, one could say that, despite its wealth of episodes, the argument of the Quixote is not a long one. It is the story of a man who sets out to restore the world of chivalry; when he thinks he is about to prove his success, he suddenly discovers that it has eluded him; he undergoes a process of disillusionment which leads inevitably to a point where his total failure is manifest. In my view, this occurs at the Duke's castle. Subsequent episodes fall outside the organic unity of the completed action. They do, nonetheless, influence our response to the work, as I presently argue. (N. from the A.)

A paper read at the Annual Meeting of the Asociación Canadiense de Hispanistas in Vancouver, B. C., on June 1, 1983, now presented in slightly revised form. (N. from the A.)

I note that A. J. Close -«Don Quixote and the 'Intentional Fallacy'», British journal o/ Aesthetics, 12 (1972), 21- lists «making propaganda» as one of the «ends which works of art, considered as complete entities, may properly be said to promote». (N. from the A.)

«Hanse de casar las fábulas mentirosas con el entendimiento de los que las leyeren,» Don Quijote, I, 47 (ed. Riquer, Barcelona: Juventud, 1958), p. 482. (N. from the A.)

What follows in this paragraph summarizes the account given by Rodríguez Marín in his edition of Viaje del Parnaso (Madrid: Bermejo, 1935), pp. ix-xii. (N. from the A.)

Obras poéticas de Luis de Góngora, ed. Foulché-Delbosc (N.Y.: Hispanic Society of America, 1921), II, 6. (N. from the A.)