"El alba bella que las perlas cría": Dawn-Description in the novels of Cervantes
E. C. Riley
The celebrated passage in the second chapter of Don Quixote I, beginning “Apenas habia el rubicundo Apolo”, has given rise to a good deal commentary at one time or another. Cervantes is parodying literary commonplace here, so it easy enough find elaborately described dawns works earlier writers, and correspondingly difficult identify precise model for question—if there one. Conventional descriptions dawn, entirely serious character, occur elsewhere his writings, notably Galatea, but he treats subject third way too, which not exactly parody straightforward. It received less attention than parody, although is, I think, least as much interest. Of course dawn-description any sort hardly looms large work, yet does offer small illustration attitude ornamental manner and, case type, stylistic technique considerable general significance Quixote.
Bulletin of Hispanic Studies