Un "pecado tan malo y feo": variaciones cervantinas sobre el suicidio

Suicide (or death by desperation) is a frequent motif in Cervantes’ drama and prose (and even in some poems), wherein one finds this impressive form of death in a diversity of manners, strategies and senses. From La Galatea to Don Quijote and from the Novelas ejemplares and the theatre to Los trabajos de Persiles y Sigismunda, this article aims to explore the Cervantine variations on suicide according to its range (from menace to commission), its causes (love, honour, and religion) and its function, in relation with the concept of decorum and the literary genre. This perspective tries to advance a better understanding of the dimension and sense of the suicide motif in Cervantes’ production as a whole.