I was mad, now I am in my senses

The expression “I was mad, now I am in my senses” marks Don Quixote’s final rejection of the chivalric identity that has governed his adventures. In the same declaration, he distinguishes the knight he had been from the man he now claims to be: “I was mad, now I am in my senses; I was Don Quixote of La Mancha, I am now, as I said, Alonso Quixano the Good.” The words make recovery a change of identity as well as a claim about reason.

Wording and Meaning

The paired clauses move from madness to sense, then from one name to another. The past-tense “was” places both the delusion and the Don Quixote persona behind him; the present-tense “am” gives authority to Alonso Quixano the Good. Rather than treating the knight as a disguise he can simply resume, the declaration presents that identity as belonging to a finished period of his life.

The Final Scene

The expression comes as Sancho urges his master not to die and proposes that they go into the fields dressed as shepherds. He suggests that Dulcinea might be found disenchanted and that defeat need not end a knight’s career: the vanquished could be victorious another day. Samson Carrasco agrees with Sancho’s reasoning, but Don Quixote stops the appeal and turns instead to the notary. His declaration therefore answers a concrete invitation to continue living through another imagined role: he refuses it and proceeds with his final instructions.

Consequences and Significance

Don Quixote asks that repentance and sincerity restore the esteem others once had for him, then dictates provisions for his estate. He leaves his property to his niece after specified payments, including the housekeeper’s wages and twenty ducats for a gown, and appoints the curate and Samson Carrasco as executors. His condition for his niece’s marriage makes the renunciation especially explicit: a prospective husband must be found not to know what books of chivalry are, or she will lose her inheritance. The expression thus connects restored reason to practical decisions that repudiate the romances that shaped his former self.