#I guess it makes sense to also go from prolific author whos an antifan of the more innovative comedic guy to

[lwoorl]

So I might be bringing everything to Cervantes vs Vega cause I’m currently working an article regarding their relationship, but a thing not many people know is that they knew each other and, while they started as good friends, by the end of their careers they HATED. THEIR. GUTS.

(Well, we don’t know how much of it was, like, legit hate, but we still got lots of scathing correspondence of them just insulting each other and their writing to hell and back, so critics maintain the “Young friends to bitter rivals” narrative, and that’s what we’ll keep for this comparison)

Just look at this shit Lope wrote when Cervantes was just about to publish his book: “De poetas, muchos están en ciernes para el año que viene; pero ninguno hay tan malo como Cervantes ni tan necio que alabe a Don Quijote” (Of poets, many are in the making for the coming year; but there is none so bad as Cervantes nor so foolish that he praises Don Quijote)

Lope even sent a letter in which he called things like pig and ass which I’m not adding here cause it’s rather long, but you can look it up. Anyway, my point is, Lope was a fucking antifan.

And Cervantes, in the prologue of the Don Quijote also attacked him back! When he writes "están otros libros, tan llenos de sentencias de Aristóteles, de Platón y de toda la caterva de filósofos..." (There are other books, so full of sentences by Aristotle, Plato and the whole bunch of philosophers...) He’s alluding to Vega! Saying “He’s so fucking pretentious, my god he’s so pretentious, so full of shit, at least my book isn’t this pretentious)

There are even people who believe Lope wrote the Quijote de Avellaneda as a Fuck You to Cervantes (The unofficial continuation to Don Quijote that eventually inspired Cervantes to publish the real, actual second part of the story in grand part as a “No! Fuck YOU!”) so like, you see where I’m coming from on the comparison, right? They’re antifans and one of them writes a continuation to the story to spite the other???

Now, if we try to assign SQH and SQQ roles I think that’s where the comparison breaks a little. SQH is closer to Lope, yes, since he was very prolific and… uh… kind of a sellout if we’re honest (watch me get killed by the literary critics. Look I love his work as much as anyone But You Know I’M Right!!!). Plus, he played into the topics that were popular at the time (transcendental love, God, etc). Meanwhile, Cervantes, while also very prolific (In fact he was a “Try everything at least once!” kind of guy, at least when it comes to poetry) wrote on less popular topics (The life of the common man, for example) and his style is harder to define, being characterized by his wit and humor, which reminds me of svsss vs pidw, a little, I guess. With pidw being the usual “popular, more serious book” (in its respective genre) and svsss being a parody and a comedy.

But also, Lope is the antifan in this case (well they both are antifans of each other, but my god, read the letters, Lope is the absolutely the biggest antifan in my eyes) and the one rumored with writing an apocryphal continuation, but also also there’s the fact Cervantes eventually wrote The Amazing Don Quijote 2: The revenge on Avellana so like, yes, the comparison breaks at this point. It was very thin to begin with, but I still feel like I’m onto something, I’m onto something right here, yeah, you just wait

Oh you know what book Scum Villain is actually very much like?

Don Quixote.

Goofy-ass comedic narrative-about-narratives that can be summarized as 'a lot of unnecessarily stupid things happen to a man with just so much genre-poisoned misunderstanding of everything, including himself.'

Yes Don Quixote went on to be enshrined as one of the foundational texts of Western Literature, and has been interpreted by Great Minds as being About an incredible range of really deep political and identity things, some of which may even have been correct.

But also just. We've got a protagonist guy whose identity has become lost inside a Lord Somebody as a consequence of reading wayyyyyy too much pseudohistorical schlock. A guy who inspires simultaneous responses of 'look at this clown' and 'omg he's me irl.'

Satirical genre pastiche relying on the collision of the modern banal and the imaginary elevated past for both bathos and social commentary, and the conflict between literary convention and real human psychology for narrative and even some pathos. The incredible embarrassment around the entire wildly inappropriate romance. Don Quixote was always first and foremost a comedy about fan behavior.

It's the same Kind of a novel.

[izartn]

lwoorl tags: 

#Of course it would make sense for sqh and sqq's roles to be a bit reversed if we think of svsss as a reversal on don quijote #So if we go from a sorta reverse isekai in which a guy believes novels are real to a full on isekai in which a guy KNOWS he's in a novel #I guess it makes sense to also go from prolific author whos an antifan of the more innovative comedic guy to #guy who stars in a comedy and parody whos an antifan of the more prolific sellout guy? #Maybe?#This comparison is thin I know it's thin and shallow but by god it's also hilarious and I got a shovel and I'm ready to dig#and there's of course also a reversal in that sqh and sqq start as 'enemies' (sorta) and end up as friends SO #Plus another reversal! These writers operate in the proper 'canon' of literature #while svsss deals with stallion novels and danmei which are ill regarded genresRebloguearVer publicación

Oh you know what book Scum Villain is actually very much like?

Don Quixote.

Goofy-ass comedic narrative-about-narratives that can be summarized as 'a lot of unnecessarily stupid things happen to a man with just so much genre-poisoned misunderstanding of everything, including himself.'

Yes Don Quixote went on to be enshrined as one of the foundational texts of Western Literature, and has been interpreted by Great Minds as being About an incredible range of really deep political and identity things, some of which may even have been correct.

But also just. We've got a protagonist guy whose identity has become lost inside a Lord Somebody as a consequence of reading wayyyyyy too much pseudohistorical schlock. A guy who inspires simultaneous responses of 'look at this clown' and 'omg he's me irl.'

Satirical genre pastiche relying on the collision of the modern banal and the imaginary elevated past for both bathos and social commentary, and the conflict between literary convention and real human psychology for narrative and even some pathos. The incredible embarrassment around the entire wildly inappropriate romance. Don Quixote was always first and foremost a comedy about fan behavior.

It's the same Kind of a novel.