Acknowledgements
The origins of this book go back to 2011–12, when my first readings of colonial epic coincided with conversations and encounters which provoked a deep personal reflection on pacifism, community and the many means of resistance to conflict. This initial fusion of ideas was nurtured by Jonathan Thacker and Geraldine Hazbun, while I also learned much from David Hook, to whose enthusiastic bibliophilia I owe any competence in palaeography and history of the book. Rodrigo Cacho was a major influence on the research, from whose kindness, encouragement, intelligence and vast philological knowledge it has benefitted immeasurably. Louise Haywood and Gabriela Ramos also proved to be much valued and insightful interlocutors.
Since then, many people have read, revised and helped to shape all or part of the book. I am particularly indebted to Mercedes Blanco, Annabel Brett, Alice Brooke, Karoline Cook, Luis Gómez Canseco, Colin Gordon, Andrew Laird, Giuseppe Marcocci, Rich Rabone, Alison Sinclair, Felipe Valencia, and Elizabeth Wright, who have posed important questions, opened up new perspectives, and inspired me with their own scholarship and wisdom.
Many conferences and colloquia stimulated fruitful conversations that fed into the research. I would like to single out Mercedes Blanco’s research seminars at Université Paris-Sorbonne, and the symposia hosted by Lise Segas at Université Bordeaux Montaigne in 2016, and Emiro Martínez-Osorio in Toronto in 2019, which stood out for the quality of the scholarship presented and the exchanges on Iberian epic which followed. I have also been fortunate to enjoy two productive periods of research at the Huntington Library, California, and the Kluge Center, Library of Congress, Washington D.C., both facilitated by the funding of the Arts and Humanities Research Council. I am grateful to the staff and librarians at both institutions for their warm reception and guidance, as well as to the communities of scholars in residence.
I would like to thank Megan Milan and the editorial team at Tamesis for their patience and diligence, as well as the anonymous reviewer of the manuscript for their comments.
Finally, this book owes much indeed to the love and support of my family, particularly my parents, Catherine and Raul Sutton, and my husband, Youngchan Justin Choi. The former instilled a love of words and literature, while the latter has lived with this research from its beginnings, provided unwavering support, and kept me thinking, laughing and exploring. The final word goes to Aurora Morcillo, with whom I am thankful to have enjoyed a short but meaningful friendship before her untimely death in 2020. I trust that her contagious enthusiasm, generosity and hopefulness will live on in the many younger scholars whose lives she has touched. The epigraph in the introduction is a tribute to our unfinished conversations about poetry and history, with their reminder that there is always more to be learned.