Don Quixote or the disenchantment of a revolutionary. On Alfred Schütz

Abstract

Can Quixote be seen as a symbol of the revolutionary political parties trying to introduce a new reality in the disenchanted bourgeois world? In the 1950’s, when Schütz presented his analysis of Quixote, the ideological choice was capitalist market or communist planism. It was addressed by Schütz in the article “Making music together” (1951), where he contrasted two models of social cooperation, the symphonic orchestra, and the jazz band. Quixote shared a common pattern with the symphonic orchestra and communist planism. In these cases, reality seems to come out of books: books of chivalry, the musical partiture, or the communist dogma. In all cases a different reality of a higher order is introduced in our chaotic “paramount reality”, expressed by Sancho Panza, the jazz band, and the market. But to achieve social relationship all realities must be reduced to the common denominator of a disenchanting common sense.