My project.

In the manuscript, as a result of the seemingly unnecessary series of identifications (Amadís–Ardián; Amadís–combatants), and the reporting of the identification of the combatants (“e dixo a don Brumeo que tomase las s[sus armas que cu]idaba que era don Galaor”), the fortuitous nature of Amadís’ encounter of his brother on the Ínsola Triste might appear to be somewhat less apparent than in the corresponding scene in Montalvo’s edition. In the printed chapter, chance is thematized throughout and the unexpected, but lucky encounter fuels several subsequent affirmations of Amadís and Galaor’s pleasure to see one another (“Y desque fueron desarmados, abraçáronse muchas vezes Amadís y don Galaor, llorando del plazer que en se ver avían”), the reporting of the news to Queen Brisena (“–Amigos, lo que a mí me plazería es que os vais a la reina Brisena y le digáis cómo os embía el su cavallero de la Ínsola Firme, y que fallé a don Galaor mi hermano, y besadle las manos por mí”), and later in Queen Brisena’s meeting of her two sons, not seen together since their first encounter with another giant (“–¡Ay, Virgen María Señora!, ¿y qué es esto, que mis hijos veo ante mí?”). Nevertheless, the difference is more a question of how suspense is created in the earlier text. At least in this scene, there are no gaps for the reader to invent or imagine, but rather a contiguous block of identifications. The effect here, is arguably more confusing, even annoying rather than clarifying, but one that emphases, painstakingly, identification, the calling of names, not by arms, but by memory, appearance of person, and skill in fighting.

How is it that four tiny pieces provoke so much confusion and such a stumbling prose? Filled with qualifiers and probably many more uncertainties than I actually confess in written form, this is a piece of a paragraph I wrote the other day on the piece of the Amadís manuscript that appears on folio 2v. It is a fascinating and troubling reading experience having to ask oneself, in earnest, Who is talking? Who is the listener? Would this character, as I think he might speak in this part of a hypothetical text say this? If I suggest that there is redundant direct discourse in this part, might that be the case with other hypothetical sections? It is all too clear that nothing is given; here, perhaps more than ever, reading becomes construction. Neither is there any agreement on in what, exactly, the manuscript consists, even the order in which we might attempt to read it. It is noteworthy that despite the fact that it is literally impossible to read the manuscript without the aid of Montalvo’s printed book and the scholarship on the same, the manuscript is bound according to a different story, inconsistent with the chronology in Montalvo: the largest fragments, which were discovered first, flank the tiniest pieces. The manuscript begins with the piece that maps quite closely to chapter 68 and what follows is an older story of chapter 65. Rodríguez-Moñino initially transcribed the fragments in accordance with another story yet: that of their discovery in the late 1950’s, with the largest fragments first.

Last May, I actually considered, seriously, that one should read these fragments in isolation; that is, such that we might return to the referent and appreciate these handwritten pages as a phenomenon in themselves or phenomena in themselves, we must move beyond comparison with the printed books. The proximity, insofar as I and others have been able to discern of the fragments to the 16th century redaction is both a detriment and an advantage. It both allows scholars of the manuscript to imagine themselves as readers of a narrative with which they are familiar, thanks to the printed editions, but also frames the fragments as pieces that are at best supplementary, if not mostly useless, to the printed version and to the study of the work Amadís de Gaula. It is in their tiny details, some of which must be considered, at least for a time, more important than they probably are, in the analysis of these details, in the manuscript’s difference, that the manuscript pieces become viable texts: ones available and open to commentary. The irony, however, is that in the process of engaging in this comparative work, the fragments’ extinction becomes even more imminent: Montalvo’s edition threatens to swallow the fragments whole. The trick, it seems, is pulling the rug out from under printed pages just when they have resolved to eat the little pieces, spread with a nice layer of marmalade, for breakfast. Fortunately for me, it turns out that part of reading these fragments is a willingness to engage in a series of episodes of pretending or deceit: tricking oneself that these fragments were selections intentionally saved from a complete manuscript; pretending, for a minute, that these scenes are metonymies for their absent whole, allowing them to swallow the big, missing, it.

I save the metaphors for the end, because I cannot do without. My friend sent me a passage today which inspired a reflection that fragments, these ones, are like old, donated garments that we come across in a thrift store not having remembered that we had ever thrown them out.

I like to think of what one of the Amadís fragments would answer if I were to ask it:

What are you? What is it you mean to say? What do you think of all of us handilng you and calling you names? I think the answer would be:

None of those questions has ever occurred to me.