Love and the Law in Cervantes

The consolidation of law and the development of legal writing during Spain’s Golden Age not only helped that country become a modern state but also affected its great literature. In this fascinating book, Roberto González Echevarría explores the works of Cervantes, showing how his representations of love were inspired by examples of human deviance and desire culled from legal discourse. González Echevarría describes Spain’s new legal policies, legislation, and institutions and explains how, at the same time, its literature became filled with love stories derived from classical and medieval sources. Examining the ways that these legal and literary developments interacted in Cervantes’s work, he sheds new light on Don Quixote and other writings.

"'This provocative study contextualizes a series of Cervantes texts within a framework in which the politics of love and law interacted with new forms of legal discourse as well as refashioned Classical and medieval sources.' (Carmen Peraita, The Years Work in Modern Language Studies) 'An informative study on the love/law conflict in Cervantes... Wide-reaching, providing basic information about Cervantes's texts for non-Hispanists and more detailed observations for Cervanistas, and for this the author should be commended... Enlightening and stimulating.' (Shannon M. Polchow, Comparative Literature Studies)"

Roberto González Echevarría is Sterling Professor of Hispanic and Comparative Literature at Yale University.

The consolidation of law and the development of legal writing during Spain's Golden Age not only helped that country become a modern state but also affected its great literature. In this fascinating book, Roberto Gonzalez Echevarria explores the works of Cervantes, showing how his representations of love were inspired by examples of human deviance and desire culled from legal discourse. Gonzalez Echevarria describes Spain's new legal policies, legislation, and institutions and explains how, at the same time, its literature became filled with love stories derived from classical and medieval sources. Examining the ways that these legal and literary developments interacted in Cervantes's work, he sheds new light on "Don Quixote and other writings.

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