Social classes and inequality in modern society

¶ … Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, better known as Miguel de Cervantes. The first section will be a brief biography of his life and times. Following will be an examination of his works, including Don Quixote, La Galatea, and Entremeses. Focus will be on how different classes of people appear in his works with examples of characters of lower, middle and upper class standing in Cervantes' world. The paper will conclude with ideas of class in general.

Miguel de Cervantes Saaverdra

Miguel de Cervantes Saaverdra's reputation rests almost entirely on the most famous figure in Spanish literature, Don Quixote. Known by most as Miguel de Cervantes, his production of novels, plays and poems was considerable. According to Jean Canavaggio, author of "Cervantes," a contemporary of Cervantes, William Shakespeare, had read Don Quixote. (1990) In spite of his fame throughout Europe, Cervantes spent his life as a poor man. Cervantes life was unsettled from an early age.

Cervantes was born in 1547 in a small town near Madrid called Alcala de Henares. Of minor nobility, he was the fourth of seven children. His mother was Leonor de Cortinas and his father was Rodrigo de Cervantes an apothecary-surgeon. His father moved the family frequently from town to town in search of stable work. Cervantes was educated in Madrid by Juan L. pez de Hoyos in 1568-69 and in 1569, went to Rome in the service of Guilio Acquavita, (who later became a cardinal of the Catholic Church). A year later, Cervantes joined a Spanish regiment headquartered in Naples. In 1571 Cervantes took part in a sea battle against the Turks at Lepanto in which he received a wound in his left hand that left it permanently maimed. Proud of his role in the battle and in the nickname he earned from it, el manco de Lepanto, (the cripple of Lepanto), he continured his military career after a period of recuperation in Messina, Sicily.

In 1575 while on a return trip to Spain with his brother, Rodrigo, he was captured by pirates, taken to Algiers and enslaved. His brother Rodrigo was ransomed in 1577, but Miguel was considered by the Moors to be a more important person because he carried letters from important people back in Italy. As a result he spent 5 years as a slave until his family back in Spain could raise enough money to secure his release. His family along with the help of the Trinitarian order paid the Moors 500 escudos for his freedom.

While holding several poorly paid administrative posts in Madrid Cervantes published his first play, "Los Tratos De Argel," (1580) which was based on his experiences as a captive of the Moors. In 1584, he married Catalina de Salazar y Palacios, who was 18 years younger then Cervantes. His marriage was childless and he left his wife in the late 1580s. Following the separation from his wife Cervantes led a nomadic life for the next 20 odd years. He suffered bankruptcy and imprisonment at least twice. In 1606 Cervantes settled permanently in Madrid, spending the rest of his life there.

Cervantes started his literary career in Andalusia in 1580. According to Cervantes, he wrote 20-30 plays, but only two copies have survived. His first major work was the La Galatea (1585), a pastoral romance. It received little contemporary notice and Cervantes never wrote the continuation for it, which he repeatedly promised. In his play El Trato de Argel, printed in 1784, Cervantes dealt with the life of Christian slaves in Algiers. Novelas Ejemplares, (1613, Exemplary Tales), is a collection of short stories, which contains some of his best prose work about love, idealism, gypsy life, madmen, and talking dogs. (Canavaggio) According to legend, Don Quixote was written while in prison at Argamasilla in La Mancha. According to literary scholars, Cervantes' idea was to give a picture of real life, manners and expression in clear and simple words, as he states in his prologue to Part I of Don Quixote. The use of everyday speech in fiction was hailed by the then reading public. Part I was published in 1605 and the second part was published in 1615

In 1613 his completed collection of short stories appeared in Madrid; his satiric poem, Journey from Parnassus was published a year later; and in 1615, Cervantes was able to publish some of his theatrical works. Cervantes as assessed his final prose fiction, The Travails of Persiles and Sigismunda, whose dedication he finished four days before his death, among the best of his work

Cervantes died in April of 1616.

Social Class in Cervantes' Novels

Cervantes' novels introduced the reading public of the time to characters from all strata of life. Don Quixote was a man of noble birth, at least in the mind of Alonso Quixano, who bests represents the upper middle class of his day. While Galercio in La Galatea is a Shepard of very modest means and is representative of the lower class.