Allegories of love : Cervantes's Persiles and Sigismunda /

This wide-ranging and intellectually rigorous work will become as indispensable a tool for future inquiry into Cervantes's most enigmatic text as the investigations of Alban Forcione (Cervantes, Aristotle and the Persiles, 1970, and Cervantes' Christian Romance: A Study of Persiles and Sigismunda, CH, Mar'73). Applying comparative, humanistic, and literary criticism with admirable skill, Wilson ranges in her observations from a lucid examination of Greek romances, neoplatonic love theories, allegory, and witchcraft to Freudian elaborations of dreams and personalities. Her theses--that Cervantes was transforming romance and that the Persiles gives voice to the marginalised figures of society, especially women--are argued vigorously and persuasively. The analyses of the text are particularly stimulating, incorporating both the main plot and the numerous interpolated "exemplary" tales. Wilson has done an excellent job not only in offering a refreshing "modern" reading of the text but also in demonstrating the complexity of the Persiles within a European romance frame. Very good index, although it does not make up for a lack of bibliography. -J. G. Hughes, University of Toronto