This is a topic I’ve discussed a lot, especially in my last blog post, and it’s has to do with Don Quixote giving Sancho something he couldn’t by himself (and the fact that Sancho thinks he still going to get a govern ship to an island), but that’s just the positives. What about all the insults he endures, the torture he faces, and being a away from his family, because Don Quixote really doesn’t have one.
I’ve talked about why Don Quixote insults Sancho, but why does Sancho seemingly ignores Don Quixote considering that in the second volume, Sancho has been talking back much more on everything except insults, and he stays humble. In the beginning of the Duke and Duchess episode, Don Quixote makes it blunt by saying “if your highnesses were to have this fool away from here…”(vol 2, ch 31, Grossman), and Sancho gets some backup from the Duchess complimenting his wisdom, where Sancho replies “… account of the good opinion you have for me, though I don’t deserve it.” Sancho probably didn’t expect that.
image: https://www.google.com/search?q=the+duke+and+duchess+don+quixote&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjAl-uAhbPXAhUI6CYKHY4dBqYQ_AUICigB&biw=1366&bih=662#imgrc=iNhbFbnkD7lkkM:
The Duchess, as well as the Duke, definitely isn’t your best friend my any means. They constantly prank both of them, so this compliment might be fake and only used to pretend, and catch Don Quixote and Sancho off guard, but Don Quixote’s insult might have been as fake as the Duchess’s compliment, and this is where Sancho gets past the insults: they’re fake. Sancho knows that Don Quixote is just trying to be a true knight, and he’s sacrificing for that. His sacrifice didn’t just start here, the servants attacking him, the Holy Brotherhood, and and leaving his family.
Sancho’s family definitely wasn’t the most encouraging. Sancho’s new found dedication to have adventures with Don Quixote came not only with not being with your family, but losing trust in his wife and niece, and is probably the only time Sancho ever insulted anyone unintentionally, but why? Why would Sancho rather insult his own wife than a crazy guy who thinks he’s a knight? The answer can’t explained, but it’s so true. A possibility is that while his wife may be less insane (but who knows?), Sancho trusts Don Quixote more. Sancho has followed Don Quixote on all his adventures; he does not interfere with Don Quixote’s plan and now that he’s still alive, he’s going for a second helping, and like most adventures, they’re more exiting after the adventure has ended.
A final word about Sancho’s loyality to Don Quixote is through one of the pranks by the Duke and the Dutchess: Merlin the Magician. Merlin is a fictional character from around the sixth century, and in Cervantes’s novel, it’s close to the seventeenth century. Merlin tells Sancho that to remove the spell from Dulcinea, he must get three thousand three hundred lashes, but Sancho resists. He knows that Dulcinea is not under a spell, but eventually agrees, and even lashes himself five times (this may not be true as Sancho said so). Sancho is willing to get lashed over three thousand times even though he never does. Sancho’s willingness to sacrifice seems almost unbounded, but does anyone know about it?
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