The History of Don Quixote, Volume 1, Part 09

In Short

This portion of the great Spanish classic tracks Don Quixote into the wilderness of the Sierra Morena, where he resolves to perform extreme acts of romantic penance for his imagined lady, Dulcinea del Toboso. Accompanying him is his pragmatic squire, Sancho Panza, whose commonsense commentary contrasts sharp comedy against Quixote's poetic delusions. Along their trek, they cross paths with Cardenio, a heart-broken noble driven genuinely mad by romantic betrayal. Celebrated across centuries, the narrative endures because it balances hilarious slapstick with a profound, compassionate exploration of human illusion, loyalty, and grief.

The Story

The narrative opens in the rugged wastes of the Sierra Morena, where Don Quixote and Sancho Panza encounter Cardenio, a ragged wanderer driven out of his mind by sorrow. When Quixote promises to alleviate or share his pain, Cardenio demands food before recounting how his wealthy friend, Don Fernando, betrayed him by secretly marrying Cardenio's beloved Luscinda. The tale ends abruptly when Cardenio offhandedly insults a character from a popular book of chivalry, sending Quixote into an explosive rage to defend fictional honor and inciting a physical brawl that drives Cardenio back into the wild.

Once alone, Quixote announces his intention to copy the classic chivalric heroes by undertaking a period of voluntary madness and penance in the wilderness. He selects a solitary green meadow beside a mountain peak to weep, compose poetry, and perform wildly theatrical feats of grief in honor of Dulcinea del Toboso. Sancho Panza openly questions the necessity of this torment, pointing out that Quixote has no actual evidence of infidelity or rejection from his lady. Quixote brushes off these rational objections, writing a passionate love letter and an order for three ass-colts in Cardenio’s leftover notebook. When Quixote reveals that Dulcinea is actually the peasant girl Aldonza Lorenzo, Sancho expresses utter shock, but he nevertheless agrees to deliver the missive to El Toboso.

Before departing, Sancho insists on witnessing at least one genuine act of madness so he can swear to it in good conscience; Quixote promptly strips to his shirt and performs somersaults in the air. Sancho rides off on Rocinante, strewing broom branches along the path to ensure his return. Pausing near an inn he remembers all too well, Sancho meets the local priest and barber from Quixote's home village, who are searching for the lost knight. Sancho cannot remember the exact text of the love letter, but his terrible recollection of its contents and his absolute faith in Quixote's future as an emperor heavily amuse the pair.

Determined to save Quixote, the curate and barber devise a scheme to disguise themselves as a distressed damsel and her squire to trick Quixote into leaving his retreat. As they journey into the mountains guided by Sancho, they hear a mournful voice singing a sonnet about lost friendship. Tracing the sound, they discover Cardenio during a lucid interval. Cardenio completes his heartbreaking narrative, detailing how he watched Luscinda collapse in a faint at her wedding after whispering her vows, leaving behind a hidden letter in her bosom. Before the priest can offer comfort, another mysterious voice echoes through the wilderness, drawing the travelers toward the next chapter of their journey.

How It Unfolds

The ragged wanderer Don Quixote offers his knightly service to a ragged man wandering the Sierra Morena, offering either to relieve the stranger's deep sorrow or join him in lamenting it. The exhausted man asks for food first, promising to share his tragic history after satisfying his hunger.

A quarrel over fiction Cardenio begins the story of his lost love Luscinda and his treacherous friend Don Fernando, but he strays into mentioning a book of chivalry. When he makes a disparaging remark about a queen from the romance, Quixote furiously defends the fictional lady's honor, igniting a violent fight that halts the story.

The vows of voluntary madness Reaching an isolated, green mountain meadow, Quixote decides to perform severe romantic penance to prove his devotion to Dulcinea. He strips down to execute acrobatic somersaults, writes a letter to his love in a small notebook, and instructs Sancho to deliver it.

The squire's mission Sancho departs on Rocinante to deliver the letter, strewing branches along the mountain path so he can find his way back. Along the road he meets the curate and the barber from his hometown, who concoct a disguised rescue plan after hearing Sancho's absurdly mangled version of Quixote’s romantic letter.

The tale of betrayal Guided back toward Quixote by Sancho, the party discovers Cardenio singing mournfully in the woods during a moment of sanity. Cardenio finishes his story, recounting how Don Fernando stole Luscinda and forced her into a secret marriage, driving Cardenio into grief-stricken exile.

The People

• Don Quixote wants to live out the ideals of ancient knight-errantry by performing acts of grand romantic penance in the wilderness. Standing in his way is the mundane reality of the world and his own unyielding obsession with chivalric tales. Through his penance, he plunges deeper into theatrical delusion, stripped down both physically and mentally in service of his invented ideals.

• Sancho Panza wants simple material security, compensation in ass-colts, and the freedom to speak his mind without his master's restrictions. Standing in his way is his own gullibility and his master's unpredictable, dangerous caprices. He ends up caught between his practical peasant common sense and a growing, reluctant commitment to Quixote's grand illusions.

• Cardenio wants relief from the agonizing betrayal that shattered his life, yet he refuses any true consolation or medical help. Standing in his way is his own overwhelming grief and periodic bouts of sudden, unmanageable madness. He ends up a wandering fugitive in the mountains, oscillating between absolute lucidity and wild distraction as he tells his tragic love story.

In Its Own Voice

"I had resolved not to quit these mountains until I had found you, and learned of you whether there is any kind of relief to be found for that sorrow under which from the strangeness of your life you seem to labour..."

— Don Quixote greets the mysterious, ragged wanderer of the Sierra Morena, offering his service as a knight-errant to either heal the man's grief or share in his weeping.

"...pulling off his breeches in all haste he stripped himself to his skin and his shirt, and then, without more ado, he cut a couple of gambados in the air, and a couple of somersaults, heels over head..."

— The knight performs his dramatic acts of romantic madness in the wilderness so Sancho can truthfully report his master's extreme devotion to Dulcinea.

"...for to them the impossibility of being consoled is itself a consolation, while to me it is the cause of greater sorrows and sufferings..."

— Cardenio finishes his tragic story of romantic betrayal, explaining to his listeners why he actively seeks destruction in the mountain solitudes.

What It's Really About

This section of the text centers on the dangerous line between performance and genuine mental affliction. Don Quixote chooses madness as a deliberate, poetic style, carefully imitating the heroic grief of storybook knights to build his own romantic legacy. In stark contrast, Cardenio suffers from authentic, agonizing heartbreak that strips him of his reason without any conscious choice or grand design. The narrative continuously questions whether belief can reshape reality, showing how Quixote turns an ordinary peasant woman into an immaculate noble lady, while Sancho allows absurd promises of future empires to override his practical senses. Through these intersecting lives, the story investigates how human beings construct personal myths to survive, escape, or justify their deepest heartbreaks and failures.

Why Read It Today

This text remains astonishingly modern because it invented the double-act format that drives comedic literature to this day. Watching Quixote’s lofty, hyper-literary romanticism collide with Sancho Panza’s earthbound peasant wisdom provides a constant spark of genuine humor. Readers who enjoy rich character interplay, sharp dialogue, and nested storytelling will find themselves entirely at home in these mountain scenes.

The narrative demands some patience, as early modern prose favors long, meandering sentences and lengthy dramatic monologues. Readers must also adjust to sudden shifts between slapstick violence and formal literary debate, alongside period conventions surrounding chivalric romance and tragic melodrama. Yet what remains with you long after reading is the unexpected tenderness at the book's core. Beneath the flying somersaults, lost letters, and absurd disguises lies a deeply empathetic study of friendship, grief, and the noble, ridiculous lengths people will go to make sense of a confusing world.