Es mostren els missatges amb l'etiqueta de comentaris #donquixote. Mostrar tots els missatges
Es mostren els missatges amb l'etiqueta de comentaris #donquixote. Mostrar tots els missatges

dimarts, de febrer 27, 2024

SOBRE JORGE ABRIL SÁNCHEZ I EL QUIXOT

 En l’article ben documentat de Jorge Abril Sánchez (Trans)National Cervantes: The Catalan (Pseudo)Biography of the Father of Don Quixote de la Mancha es fa la il·lusió de rebatre els arguments aportats per Bilbeny i INH però és un article que és tendenciós i que té oblits inexplicables si no són a gratcient o per ignorància i els dos motius semblen ser-hi. 


Primer, cal constatar que ja és un èxit que algú del món de les lletres castellanes ㅡ no hispàniques com se’ns ha repetit durant dècades o, millor, seglesㅡ es digni a refutar i rebatre negre sobre blanc els arguments, els indicis i fins les proves que presenta Bilbeny a propòsit de l’autor del Quixot i de la llengua en què va ser redactat. Benvinguda sigui doncs la polèmica i la contraposició d’arguments històrics i filològics. Potser sí que anem -com ha fet Anglaterra des de sempre- a una revisió constant d’un escriptor que s’han apropiat uns en nom de la unitat política. 


De fet, les conclusions d’Abril són decebedores. Concretament, després de 26 pàgines d’anàlisi que ens agradarà més o menys, hi estarem d’acord o no, però està documentada i dona raons històriques documentals, diu


CONCLUSIONS 

The appropriation of the persona and the passport of the author who is widely-known as the father of Spanish letters should be contextualized within a general plan or conspiracy to destabilize and stain a symbol that represents a nation beyond its borders. In fact, the novelist and his opus magnum  have been often referred to as the emblem and the sacred book of the Iberian people since their sacralization in the 1890s. It is honestly surprising to observe that those intellectual circles that refused to identify themselves with the writer and to participate in the festivities to celebrate the three hundredth anniversary of the publication of the First Part of his  Don Quixote  in 1905 strive today to claim consanguinity with the artist one hundred years later. It is possible that the knight’s advocacy for the vernacular languages in the sixteenth chapter of Part II and his general idealism to fight to achieve impossible objectives may have finally convinced the ideologues from Catalonia to accept the soldier’s positive energy and dreams of freedom. Their idealistic crusade to obtain the independence and secession from Spain, in spite of the obstacles in their path towards  self-determination presented by the ruling Popular Party in Madrid, forces these secessionist dreamers to attack the true, and not alternative, facts of the flagship of their political opponent’sculture to feed the imagination of their followers and to back their official story about the oppression and persecution suffered by their superior nation of Catalonia



Sembla evident que l’obsessió per Catalunya, el que fa i el que deixa de fer no li permet veure que les tesis de Bilbeny no estan fetes des de cap finalitat política. Abril ignora com va sorgir aquest revisionisme històric i creu que està sotmès a la finalitat que ell suposa, en una visió que paradoxalment és la mateixa que es critica al Quixot. Doncs li hem de dir que no, que la finalitat de Bilbeny i els seus és justament trobar la veritat que, pel que sembla ㅡ i en tenim un munt d’indicisㅡ  ens va ser arravatada. D’altra banda, Bilbeny no és l’únic revisionista i aquí podríem esmentar noms com el de César Brandariz i sobretot Francisco Calero Calero. També Americo Castro va adonar-se que en el tema del Quixot i cervantesc imperava el principi ne varietur.  Ja sabem que qualsevol argument que se li pugui donar li semblarà esbiaixat i espuri. Tampoc ignoro que alguns aspectes metodològics de Bilbeny són discutibles a ulls ja no d’Abril sinó també de la Filologia i la Història actuals en tant que disciplines. Però els fets que aporta no crec que puguin ser discutits i Abril en pretereix dos de fonamentals:


1. ㅡ  Els catalanismes de l’obra que apareixen pertot el Quixot, que no són circumstancials i que denoten alguna cosa més que l’estat de la llengua castellana al segle XVI. És clar que Abril no coneix el català i no pot opinar sobre el tema. Perquè no en sap i perquè a ell l’interessa desacreditar les tesis des d’una perspectiva política. A ell només l’interessa el Quixot com a símbol d’una ‘nació’. 


2. ㅡ Ignora també Abril que un catedràtic de la UNED ha dedicat molts esforços a demostrar que el Quixot va ser escrit per Joan Lluís Vives. Calero sí que veu la influència valenciana en el text i l’analitza en un llibre de 800 pàgines. Crec que Calero no és independentista ni ho pensa ser. Però és honest científicament i va en cerca de la veritat històrica. Ell ja ha tastat la fel de la ràbia i l’odi quan ha formulat les seves tesis, assenyades, documentades i honestes. És qüestió de temps que tot s’acabi sabent. Del desembre obscur d'una filologia captiva, inquisitorial i imperialista passarem de cop i volta a l'abril del saber i de la consciència.


diumenge, d’agost 22, 2021

DON QUIXOTE WAS FIRST WRITTEN IN CATALAN: BOOTLICKERS AND WINDMILLS.

This is not the first time that we have commented in this very modest blog on the revolutionary and insightful Jordi Bilbeny's contributions. He was the one who realized the appropriation of Catalan literary history by Castile in the 15th and following centuries. More or less as they do now differently. He has certainly not been the first to suspect over time that there was something that did not fit with what had been conveyed to us. Bilbeny also talks about it. But he has been the first to systematically and rigorously place many items on the table in the form of positive documents that should at least serve to initiate an ex novo review of the historical legacy.

It seems to me that since Mandado’s book came out, which we discussed here at the time, observations, clues, and even evidence have not stopped growing. These findings have been published on the INH website, in some books and also in the form of lectures recorded on Youtube. I do not know of any academic article that has been published in any consolidated journal of Hispanic philology, from outside, of course, because we already know what those of here think and do. And it’s not that there’s a lack of material. And it is not that what Bilbeny tells us is outlandish no matter how little it is analyzed. This is a policy - I think wrong - of the INH. Not going to the conventional academic world. Moreover, the material is published in Catalan and Spanish one has quite a different direction. If the process of dissemination is not accelerated, the first Catalan edition, predictably from 1595, will not appear, as Bilbeny says - which we must continue to search diligently - we will not be able to consolidate this new perspective that has all the appearance of being true.

There is a fact that suddenly catches your eye when you live in Catalonia. The answer to the hypotheses, clues and evidence that Bilbeny has spread have in common: they try to ridicule the theses and the person who formulates them with any weapon -everything is worth it-, and usually the most belligerent and rude are the more ignorant such as journalists of clear affiliation or anonymous prostitutes who are duly subsidized are engaged in trying to undermine the morale of the enemy in the networks. There is only silence on the part of the university. A deafening silence. It is very suspicious. Not to criticize or refute anything. Silence. And it is true that there is a strong contempt but anyone minimally trained and with historical or philological studies knows that what Bilbeny says is not only plausible but also probable. But of course, it’s not just about reviewing history, clarifying the sources, getting to the bottom of the issue, finding the truth after all. There is something much bigger at stake that is precisely what Don Quixote intended to defend against imaginary dangers. This one here is not imaginary but it is terribly true.

While some professors here and there do not even mention to criticize the new theses and persist in official history no matter how squeaky is, some Spanish novelists and 'intellectuals', even if they were born in Catalonia, do exactly the same. However, I can understand it: they defend their way of life, their bread, their name, their work and some of them their patriotic pride because they feel they are the custodians of a collective imaginary that has never existed as they thought it. Like Don Quixote. What hurts the most is that among the academics of Catalan philology, as far as I know, they do exactly the same if not worse. Surprising but it is the same attitude: silence, suspicion, feeling of false superiority and finally fear.

I have modestly dedicated myself to collecting Bilbeny's findings, among others, and they can be consulted here:

 https://docs.google.com/document/d/1PGuQGM0G7ZCb7Hi0jnry-WKcdA77bndPN1qIFe5Hha0/edit?usp=sharing

I only mention three facts that are no longer mere clues or assumptions but constitute from my point of view safe evidence to move forward. There are more, though.

1. We have documented references that in 1604, a year before the publication of the presumed first edition in Madrid, the book was already known and people were disguising themselves as Don Quixote and Sancho Panza at the Barcelona Carnival. Therefore, the 1605 edition is not the first. Cervantes tells us about the editions in Antwerp and Barcelona, which have disappeared and should appear in Catalan for the first time and were later censored and translated. This fact disallows the princeps of Madrid. And we have many clues - too many - and of a very diverse nature.

2. In the first chapter of the second part of Don Quixote there is a story that is Valencian and is found in several versions written as the Rector's Romance. This is already asked in 1922 in the book El folklore valenciano en el Don Quijote by Francisco Martínez y Martínez in a pamphlet published in Valencia. How could Cervantes, who is from Alcalá according to what we are told about, could know this romance, if he was not from Valencia or had a close relationship with it? This fact supports the thesis that Cervantes (Servent) was from Valencian land which is ratified by many other facts that you can read in the mentioned document  and put together give life to the thesis of Bilbeny without any fissure.

3. We know because it is documented, that a mysterious Thomas Shelton translated Don Quixote in 1602 (although it was published in 1612). That is, before the edition of Madrid, which means that there is another previous one, presumably from 1595 because the licenses were often granted for ten years. This observation is made by Francis Carr, who erroneously deduces that the novel was first written in English.

It does not follow that a first edition was in Catalan but it is beyond doubt that the edition of Madrid of 1605 is not the first edition of Don Quixote as we have been led to believe with interest and clumsiness. Nor is it certain that Cervantes was Valencian, but that the links with that Valencian land are very powerful to the point of knowing a local folk tale.

Tsunamis have a seismic origin and are not dangerous on the high seas, although they are getting bigger. Only when they reach the mainland they are devastating. The submarine earthquake occurred years ago and we are now in the growth phase. But when it gets dry sooner or later the effects will be inexorable and have unpredictable consequences.