This book explores Cervantes's connection with the representational schemes that dominated the political, moral, literary, and iconographic anxieties of the 1600s. Whereas most research on Cervantes's aesthetic and artistic models has focused on Southern sources (Italian and Spanish), this study expands this reference to include Northern (Flemish and Netherlandish) cultural influence. Through this artistic dialogue between North and South, the book investigates the interrelationship of politics and aesthetics, and how these are negotiated in Cervantes's works, especially in two novels, Don Quixote and The Dialogue of the Dogs.