Inigo Montoya
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Inigo Montoya is a character in William Goldman's 1973 novel The Princess Bride. In Rob Reiner's 1987 film adaptation he was portrayed by Mandy Patinkin. In both the book and the movie, he resided in the fictional country of Florin.
[edit] Character background
Inigo Montoya is a Spanish fencer and assistant to Vizzini. His father Domingo was a great swordmaker, but remained obscure because he disliked dealing with the rich and privileged. When a right-handed six-fingered nobleman, Count Rugen, asked him to forge a sword to accommodate his unusual hand, Domingo poured his heart and soul into the project. When Rugen returned, he reneged on his promised price. Thus Domingo refused to sell him the sword, not as a matter of money, but because Rugen could not appreciate the great work of the sword. He proclaimed that the sword would now belong to Inigo. Angered, Rugen killed Domingo. Eleven-year-old Inigo witnessed the crime and challenged Rugen to a fight, wherein Rugen easily disarmed Inigo, spared his life and allowed him to keep the sword, but scarred his face as a deterrent to further displays of bravery.
Devastated by the loss of his father, Inigo devoted his entire life to becoming a great swordsman in order to avenge his father. His training is 10 years long that started when ever he was 12 years old, in that it includes tutelage under the most skilled and savage fencing masters of his time. After years of training, Inigo had become the greatest swordsman of his generation, and the only living man to hold the rank of "wizard" (a fictional fencing rank above "master").
His original elaborate fantasies of revenge eventually evolved into a simple greeting: "Hello. My name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father. Prepare to die." When he finally confronts Rugen, he repeats the line and continues repeating it throughout the duel.
In the first chapter of a fictional sequel "Buttercup's Baby," the reader is introduced to another side of Inigo's character that isn't revealed in The Princess Bride. When he was about twenty, Inigo traveled to Italy where he met Giulietta, a girl he had had dreams about since age thirteen. She is "visibly touched" by his story, but tries to convince him and herself that it would never work. Inigo is surprised when he finds out that, despite dressing in servant's clothes, she is actually the daughter of a rich count. They spend a final night together at the count's palace during a ball, where the music and dancing surprasses anything the local people had ever seen. In the end, Inigo leaves with a heavy heart to continue his quest.
Another memorable quote from the movie, which is often used in popular culture, is Inigo's response to Vizzini's usage of the word "inconceivable" as an expression of surprise, indicating that Vizzini considered something impossible. Ironically, the very event Vizzini refers to is frequently occurring even as he speaks. After hearing Vizzini repeatedly misuse the word in this way, Inigo turns to him and says: "You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means."
[edit] In the story
Unable to find his father's killer and fearing that he would never fulfill his quest, Inigo sinks into depression and alcoholism before the criminal Vizzini finds him. Vizzini, Inigo, and a Turk named Fezzik are hired by an unknown king to kidnap and kill the "princess bride", Buttercup. Subsequent events lead to Inigo's duel with the "Man in Black" or Westley, Buttercup's childhood sweetheart, an extended sequence in both the book and the movie, in which both contestants begin fencing left-handed and eventually convert to their dominant right hands as the contest intensifies. Inigo is then knocked unconscious by the "Man in Black" (Westley). When he regains consciousness, he enters the thieves' quarter of a major city, depressed that he had been beaten and becomes a useless drunkard once more. Eventually, Fezzik finds him and somewhat forcibly helps him regain his health. They eventually rescue the "Man in Black" from the Zoo of Death ("Pit of Despair" in the movie; in either case a torture chamber) and take him to the magician called Miracle Max, who rescues him from his state of being "mostly dead." Toward the end of the film, Inigo joins the Man in Black to fight Humperdinck and fulfills his vow of revenge by killing his father's murderer while repeating the words: "Hello. My name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father. Prepare to die." At the end of the movie, having avenged his father and thus no longer in "the revenge business," Inigo becomes the "Man in Black"'s successor as "The Dread Pirate Roberts". The novel ends with Inigo's wounds reopening while he is on the run from the Brute Squad, leaving his future in doubt.
[edit] References
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