Tirant lo Blanch tells the story of a knight Tirant from Brittany who has a series of adventures across Europe in his quest. He joins in knightly competitions in England and France until the Emperor of the Byzantine Empire asks him to help in the war against the Ottoman Turks, Islamic invaders threatening Constantinople, the capital and seat of the Empire. Tirant accepts and is made Megaduke of the Byzantine Empire and the captain of an army. He defeats the invaders and saves the Empire from destruction. Afterwards, he fights the Turks in many regions of the eastern Mediterranean and North Africa, but he dies just before he can marry the pretty heiress of the Byzantine Empire.
Themes
Compared to books of the same time period, it lacks the bucolic, platonic, and contemplative love commonly portrayed in the chivalric heroes. Instead the main character is full of life and sensuous love, sarcasm, and human feelings. The work is filled with down to earth descriptions of daily life, prosaic and even bitter in nature.
Influence
Tirant lo Blanch is one of the most important books written in Valencian/Catalan. Written by Joanot Martorell in the 15th century, the Tirant is an unusual chivalric novel in its naturalistic and satirical character, which also appears to have a strong autobiographic component. It tells the feats and adventures of Knight Tirant lo Blanc from Brittany. At times, it parallels the life and adventures of Roger de Flor, main leader of the mercenary Company of Almogàvers, which fought in Asia Minor and Greece, both for and against the Emperor of Byzantium. This historical resemblance is evident in the description of events occurring around Constantinople and the defeat of Sultan Mehmed II "the conqueror". While Roger de Flor's almogàvers had the upper hand in the region, the Fall of Constantinople in 1453 was a huge shock to Christian Europe, marking an end to the Byzantine Empire that Martorell's contemporaries wished to change. In writing his novel, Martorell perhaps rewrote history to fit what he wanted it to be - which in a way makes it a precursor of the present-day genre of alternate history. The Spanish text of Don Quixote states, in Chapter 6 of Part I, that because of certain characteristics of Tirant - characters with unlikely or funny names such as Kirieleison de Montalbán, the presence of a merry widow, the fact that in the book knights eat, sleep, and die in their beds having made a will, and the title can be understood as "Tirant the Blank", lacking a major victory to put on his shield - the book is quite different from the typical chivalric romance. These aspects make the book exceptional, and made Cervantes state that "por su estilo", which can be translated "because of its style" but more likely means "in its own way", the book is "a treasure of enjoyment and a gold mine of recreation", the "best book in the world." It is an funny book, and Cervantes liked funny books, believed the world needed more of them, and in Don Quixote wrote his own. Cervantes saw this 100-year-old book as the crown jewel of his library. Recent scholarship has called into question some understandings of this work. In a 2011 thesis, Francisco Macias states that his "initial approach was to see the work as a conventional work of medieval literature." Yet as he worked through the intricacies of the work and resolved the questions that surfaced, he came to understand that "the work is undoubtedly a satire; and it should be analyzed as one. Martorell's narrators are quite astute; they guide us into the labyrinth that is the Tirant with hints of satirical discourse that is hidden in plain sight: satire is hidden in the blatantly obvious narrative where the reader does not question; rather, he surrenders and allows the narrator to lead him into a totally different reality. Subtleties that were not obvious from the outset become clear in retrospect." He also clarifies that "perhaps the totalizing approaches and the heft of some of the scholars, with respect to contentions concerning genre and studies of the Tirantat large, resulted in a thought-terminating cliché of sorts that stopped new scholars from feeling the need to look further for other possibilities." He admits that he "too halted." He provides some thought-provoking analysis by highlighting some connections between Tirant, Edward II, Piers Gaveston and Edward III of England. In fact, the parallels he establishes between Tirant and Edward III bring back into question the etymology of the name of Tirant, the Tyrant.
Translations and adaptations
Translations
The book has been translated into several languages including French, Italian, Spanish, Polish,, Russian, German, Dutch, Swedish and Chinese. Modern translations of the book into English include Tirant lo Blanc, translated by David H. Rosenthal and Tirant lo Blanc: The Complete Translation , translated by Ray La Fontaine.
Film adaptation
The plot of the 2006 film adaptation is based on the later part of the adventures of Tirant and events leading to his involvement in Constantinople and afterwards.
