Books of chivalry, reviewed
My honest ranking of the books of chivalry, with stars, and the sad tale of how half my library went into the yard.
I have been asked many times, by the Duke, by Don Diego de Miranda, by the bachelor Sansón Carrasco and once by a goatherd, which books of chivalry a gentleman should read. It is a fair question and deserves an honest answer. I have read them all, or nearly all. I have sold acres of good land to buy them. I have read them by day and by night, until, as my niece says, my brains dried up. My brains are perfectly moist, but the reading I did.
01 The rankings
I give five stars only to books that a knight could carry into battle, if books were armour. I give fewer, with regret, to the rest.
| Book | Stars | My notes |
|---|---|---|
| Amadís of Gaul | ★★★★★ | The first, the best, the father of all the rest. Amadís is the north star of every knight. His penance on the Poor Rock taught me how to go mad properly. |
| Palmerín of England | ★★★★★ | Beautiful castles, clever adventures, noble speeches. Deserves a jewelled case of its own. |
| Tirant lo Blanch | ★★★★☆ | Witty and very lifelike. The knights take their meals and settle their affairs like ordinary men, which is odd, but refreshing. Docked one star for this. |
| Belianís of Greece | ★★★★☆ | A fine book, though the hero receives so many wounds that the surgeons must have grown rich. The author promised a continuation; I have often thought of writing it myself. |
| The Mirror of Knighthood | ★★★☆☆ | Has Reinaldos of Montalbán and his friends, who are more thieves than knights, but the giant Morgante is a courteous fellow. |
| Felixmarte of Hyrcania | ★★★☆☆ | He cuts five armies in half with one stroke. A slight exaggeration, perhaps, but a stirring one. |
| The Exploits of Esplandián | ★★☆☆☆ | Son of Amadís, and the son does not inherit the father's goodness. A lesson for parents. |
| Don Olivante de Laura | ★★☆☆☆ | Very long. Very, very long. |
The reader will notice that I do not include the book of my own adventures, published in two parts, the true one by the Moor Cide Hamete and the false one by somebody from Tordesillas whose name I will not dignify. I cannot review the true one; modesty forbids. The false one gets no stars at all, and should be made to wear a donkey's ears.
02 What happened to my library
Now I must tell a painful story. After my first sally, when I came home sorely beaten and lay in bed recovering, my friends the priest and the barber came to the house. With my niece and my housekeeper, they took the keys of my library and went in, and made a judgement over my books, one by one, like an inquisition. The housekeeper brought a bowl of holy water and a sprinkler, to drive out any enchanters who might be lurking among the pages.
They saved Amadís, being the first of its kind. They threw Esplandián out of the window into the yard. They saved Palmerín of England and threw Palmerín de Oliva after Esplandián. They spared Belianís but only for a time, and they burned Felixmarte of Hyrcania, Olivante, and I do not know how many others. Most of what they found worthy of the fire went into the yard without being examined at all, since they were tired and it was getting dark. The housekeeper burned them that night, and I am told she enjoyed it.
Then they walled up the door of the library, so that when I got up I could not find it. I went from room to room looking for my books, feeling the walls, and my niece told me that an enchanter had come on a cloud, while I was away, riding a serpent, and had taken the whole library away in smoke, books and room and all. I knew at once that this was the work of the sage Frestón, my great enemy, who envied me then as he envies me now. I said so. Nobody disagreed.
Years later, I learned from the published history of my deeds what had really happened. I was very angry for about an hour. Then I reflected that the priest and the barber are good men, my friends, and that they acted out of concern for me, however misguided; and that it is very likely that Frestón had cast an enchantment upon them both, so that they believed themselves to be burning books when in truth they were serving his malice. I have forgiven them. The housekeeper I am still considering.
I close by advising any young man who wants to become a knight errant to read all the books in this list first, and then a few more, and then think it over for a year, which is what I am doing now.
My library (what the priest left of it)