In Don Quixote, a character praises a “very tasty cheese” and another speaks of their tears of “very joyful contentment.” It is likely that Cervantes never actually wrote these phrases. In modern Spanish, saying that something is very expensive or very painful is not considered correct from a normative perspective, but in spoken language, it is possible to come across this use of “very” with “-ísimo” without any major issues. In the early 17th century, when the two parts of this great work of literature were printed, this form of superlative ending in “-ísimo” was still solidifying in the language and it was not as clear as it is today that something that is “carísimo” is more expensive than just “muy caro.” However, combining “muy” with “-ísimo” was starting to sound strange and was not appearing as frequently in formal prose. Cervantes does not use it in his texts except for those two cases in Don Quixote.
A few years ago, it was pointed out in a book called “The Text of Don Quixote” (2005) that in order to understand the language and meaning of a work, one must also pay attention to its materiality, such as the physical support on which the text circulated. Looking at the corresponding pages where both expressions from Don Quixote are written, it is observed that in both cases, the forms with “muy -ísimo” appear on pages with a lot of space between words, with a lot of air in the lines, as if there was an excess of paper. This is the reason behind these instances of “muy -ísimo” in Don Quixote, as discovered by the philologist Francisco Rico (1942-2024). He found that in printing workshops, the internal sheets of a work were printed as independent booklets that were later folded and bound, which required a preliminary calculation of the necessary paper. He proved that printers sometimes made mistakes, either printing too few or too many pages, and if that happened, they felt free to cut out text from the original work or, on the contrary, they could insert words to fill in, similar to what students do when they do not fully understand the material and write extensively to fill up pages. These were typographic tricks used by experienced professionals. Cervantes likely only wrote “sabroso queso” or “alegre contento,” and the printer manipulated the text to fill the page.
I provide this small example as a demonstration of the typographic philology that Professor Rico taught us to perform. I could give similar examples of how he revolutionized our interpretation of “Lazarillo de Tormes,” his significant research on Petrarch, his clever explanation of the Glosses as a Latin student’s notebook, or his insightful portrait of the Sevillian Antonio de Nebrija as the first Spaniard with a sense of Europeanism who fought against those barbarians who used poor Latin. I cannot summarize the bibliography of a master, a titan of philology, in these preceding paragraphs. His contributions to the interpretation of the great texts of our past made Francisco Rico an essential reference in university classes on culture, history, and literature. But he was not just a wise scholar whose erudition improved our classes. Rico was a pioneer of one of the first television programs on language, he led editorial collections that popularized our literature in kiosks, and he was engaged in public life. In this newspaper, he published numerous articles: I recommend the one he directed, with wisdom and humanity, to Marta Rovira, secretary general of ERC, when she was indicted for rebellion and fled to Switzerland. Rico’s own statements, being from Barcelona, about nationalism show a perspective on the always buzzing Catalan issue that is free from turmoil and equidistances. Rico disagreed with the independence process and, without pandering to Catalan nationalism, he highlighted the exquisite role of Barcelona in the argument of Don Quixote and freely discussed Bernat Metge or Tirant.
Rico passed away last Saturday. When I realized on Sunday that the news of his death was not on the front pages of all Spanish newspapers, I felt deeply disappointed. It is not that just any wise specialist or meritorious enlightened scholar has died! It is Francisco Rico who has passed away! I am not so naive as to believe that Philology is more important than analyzing a president’s actions or yesterday’s football match, but it is telling to see that the death of an irreplaceable intellectual was relegated to the inside pages. It makes one want to go to libraries and take out his books in protest. I know that obituaries often fall into the forgivable sin of exaggeration, but I can afford to do so to compensate for that absence on the front pages: a very delightful conversationalist, a very generous teacher Francisco Rico, may Cervantes have you in his glory.
