“I do not deny that what happened to us is a thing worth laughing at.” —Don Quixote
Two days before the publication of my comic novel, The Seductive Lady Vanessa of Manhattanshire, I learned the setup driving the entire book had already been used by another writer—270 years ago. That meant my book, which recasts Don Quixote as a hoop-skirted, romance-novel-besotted woman questing for love in contemporary New York, was not quite as original an act of plagiarism as I had thought.
My delusion of literary innovation was shattered by Stefan Kutzenberger, an Austrian novelist and fellow Cervantes enthusiast visiting New York on a government-backed book tour. We were having a drink with a mutual friend when Stefan asked, “Did you ever read Charlotte Lennox?”
“No. Who is she?”
“She wrote a book called The Female Quixote.”
“Seriously?” I asked, breaking out my cellphone.
“Yes. Henry Fielding was a big fan.”
“1752!” I said, reading the pub date. “That’s amazing.”
I tried to remain calm. But the idea that Lennox had already deployed a similar Quixote clone left me rattled. Nobody wants to spend years on a book only to find out it has an ancient twin.
“Damn!” I said, laughing and complaining. “I can’t believe it.”
But really, it was easy to believe. Days earlier, when a friend asked how I’d hit on the idea for Lady Vanessa, I said, “I’m a big Don Quixote fan. Given romance fiction’s popularity, it just seemed like an obvious and interesting idea to explore. I’m surprised no one ever thought of it before.”
Famous last words.
I went home feeling curious and competitive. I read about my new but long-dead rival. Samuel Johnson was a friend and fan of Lennox. An essay on the web confirmed Henry Fielding “printed a very favourable review in the Covent Garden Journal, saying it was better than Don Quixote.”
Whoa. Quite a throw-down. I stopped reading about Lennox and downloaded The Female Quixote, or, The Adventures of Arabella.
After a cursory inspection of the novel, I can report it is funny but, unfortunately, very wordy. It is not “better” than the original. Most important to me, Arabella is very different from my Lady Vee. She is much younger: 17, not 48. She lives in a castle, not an Upper West Side co-op. She is paranoid about men ravishing her, whereas Lady Vanessa would like to be ravished. Arabella’s madness, at first blush, also lacks the over-the-top buffoonery of Don Quixote, which I hoped to emulate with Lady Vee.
Despite the differences, it was clear we were inspired by the same source material, 270 years apart. My mind raced. How had I missed The Female Quixote’s existence? Should I be more bruised or amused by my innocent ignorance, or by the fact that it took an Austrian novelist to enlighten me? And how had all the agents, editors, and blurbers who read Lady Vanessa failed to name-check The Female Quixote? The Cervantes scholar who’d raved about my book didn’t even mention it.
In the clear light of the next day, I realized I had it all wrong. It didn’t matter that I’d never heard of The Female Quixote. Charlotte Lennox wasn’t a rival; she was an ally! We loved the same book. Don Quixote inspired us to do the same thing in radically different time periods: recontextualize, reimagine, and reinvent.
I wrote Lady Vanessa because I love Don Quixote. I hoped to revisit the ideas Cervantes toyed with four centuries ago: censorship, the lines between fantasy and reality, literary clichés, and the power of books. I also hoped it would be entertaining.
I can’t speak for whatever drove Lennox, but we aren’t alone. The saints at Wikipedia have a list of Quixote-influenced books, amassing 27 entries. Some of literature’s greatest talents have spilled ink in tribute to the La Mancha madman: Flaubert, Dostoyevsky, Borges, Greene, and Rushdie. Lennox is the second entry.
The Wikipedia list is remarkable. What other novel has spawned so many pointed knockoffs from such talented authors? I imagined Don Quixote reading this page and swelling with pride, realizing the list was evidence of his knightly greatness. I saw him bragging to Sancho Panza about the illustrious volumes, offering them as proof he is the greatest knight in history. “These are tributes!” he crows, perhaps a little unchivalrously. “Homages! Hagiographies! Exuberant ecomiums! Astonishing accolades! All about me!”
“There is another term you have forgotten,” interrupts Sancho, feeling like the odd man out.
“What other laudation have I omitted?”
“I believe,” says Sancho dryly, “they call it fan fiction.”
Seth Kaufman is a novelist and collaborative writer who has ghosted multiple nonfiction bestsellers. His new comic novel, The Seductive Lady Vanessa of Manhattanshire, was published by Post Hill Press on June 7.
