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Part 2, Chapter 26
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Don Quixote, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Truth and Lies
Literature, Realism, and Idealism
Madness and Sanity
Intention and Consequence
Self-Invention, Class Identity, and Social Change
Summary
Analysis
Cide Hamete begins by explaining that Master Pedro is actually Ginés de Pasamonte, the chain-gang prisoner. To hide from the authorities, he disguised himself with a patch and became a puppeteer. Before entering a village, he would ask people in the previous village for gossip and important events and then use his knowledge to tell people’s fortunes, pretending that the information came from the ape.
As a puppeteer, a fraudulent fortune-teller, and a master of disguise, Ginés de Pasamonte is collage of the author. Like Ginés, an author travels around gathering knowledge about people, and then gives that knowledge back slightly changed, and disguised as new truths.
Themes
Don Quixote and Sancho spend three days on the road. On the third day they run into a noisy army: the village famous for its braying councillors is on its way to fight another village. Don Quixote rides up to them and gives a long speech explaining that they don’t need to defend their honor, since individuals cannot dishonor an entire village. There are only four good reasons to go to battle, he says: to defend Catholicism, to defend one’s own life, to defend family and possessions, and to obey one’s king. It is not Christian to seek revenge for a harmless prank. Sancho speaks up to agree with his master and brays a little, but the villagers think he is mocking them and beat him badly. The two friends hurry away. The villagers wait all day for the opposing army, but it never shows, so they go home in peace.
Quixote has a habit of giving good advice that he himself does not follow. We have described the split between Quixote’s imagination and the reality around him; a similar split takes place between his ideals, which dwell in his imagination, and his actions, which are bodily, impulsive, and somewhat unpredictable. Quixote is troubled by the split between thought and action. He believes that it is unchristian to attack people frivolously, yet he acts against this belief quite often. Nevertheless, his speech does the village good.
Themes
