Fiction as Lit crit

what effect *this* ( chivalry in art & other) had on its audience, that is.

Poster Dow: AFAIK part II of Quixote reflects on part I -- but I'm afraid I haven't yet read it.

re my comment above, another relevant word would be 'parable'.

Some writers explicitly write parables of some kind: Borges, Kafka. Others might write stories that we loosely say are parables of something. But ... the critic is forbidden to explain the parable? That seems like something that could itself be made into a parable.