SOURCE: “Narrative Interlace and Narrative Genres in Don Quijote and the Orlando furioso.” Modern Language Quarterly 58, no. 3 (September 1997): 241-68.

In the following excerpt, Quint argues that the “modern” technique of narrative interlace, in which multiple storylines are interwoven, is present in Ariosto's Orlando furioso.

Cervantes owed much to Ariosto when he created the novel in Don Quijote. He derived from the Orlando furioso both the narrative technique of interlace, which places multiple story lines next to one another, and Ariosto's particular use of it to juxtapose and intermingle hitherto distinct narrative genres. In much the same way, Cervantes links the interpolated tales of the first part of Don Quijote in terms of theme and contrasts them in terms of generic and stylistic registers, both among themselves and to the story of the mad hero. The effect is similar in the two works: generic capaciousness and the blurring of...