Neophilologus (2025) 109:317–333 https://doi.org/10.1007/s11061-025-09847-x Introduction In two prominent prose works of early modern Spain, the state of desengaño (disillu- sion) is explicitly idealized, but its mental consequences profoundly questioned. On his death bed, that knight of the triste figura, who had been engañado for so many pages, wishes only that desengaño had arrived earlier: “Y no me pesa sino que este desengaño ha llegado tan tarde” (Cervantes, 2004: 1100). Did imminent death bring about this desirable event of disillusion? Or, in the reversed order, did the growing disillusionment of the knight remove his will to live? In similar fashion, Baltasar Gracián lets his Critilo ponder the odd metaphysical constitution of the universe in relation to the concept of desengaño. Late in El Criticón, Critilo observes that “var- ias y grandes son las monstruosidades que se van descubriendo de nuevo cada día en la arriesgada peregrinación de la vida humana. Entre todas, la más portentosa es el estar el Engaño en la entrada del mundo y el Desengaño en la salida” (Gracián, 2020: 634). In these two conspicuous examples, there is no doubt that desengaño is desirable and that one could only wish that it would arrive early on in life. But the challenge of desengaño is also one of ontological proportions in the literary worlds of these two works: “Pues ¿quién los ha baraxado deste modo? ¿Quién fue aquel tan atrevido hijo de Jafet que assí los ha trastrocado?”, El Criticón proceeds to ask (ibid.: 635). It seems that the emotional forces attached to desengaño vary greatly, stretch- ing the emotive spectrum from bitterness to bliss. Desengaño might be beneficial in the awareness of not fooling oneself; but it is mentally challenging if it implies dis- content with the sober and somber realities of the human condition. You might, after all, not find what you were looking for, behind that door. Received: 20 April 2024 / Revised: 26 May 2025 / Accepted: 10 June 2025 / Published online: 15 July 2025 © The Author(s) 2025 Sacred Disillusions: The Challenge of Ambiguous desengaño in Early Modern Spain Rasmus Vangshardt 1  Rasmus Vangshardt Rasmus.vangshardt@ilos.uio.no 1 Department of Literature, Area Studies and European Languages, University Of Oslo, Oslo, Norway 1 3